Obama tears into Ed Gillespie's MS-13 ads, calling them 'as cynical as politics gets'

[DonViejo]

Source: The Washington Post




By Fenit Nirappil October 20 at 1:21 PM

RICHMOND — Former president Barack Obama took the unusual step of criticizing and mocking Virginia’s Republican gubernatorial candidate for a controversial ad blitz highlighting Latino gang violence.

-snip-

The spots say Northam is “weak on MS-13” as images of tattooed Latino men and the gang motto “Kill, Rape, Control” pop up on the screen. Independent fact-checkers deemed the ads misleading.

“We have seen this so many times before,” said Obama, who spent five minutes tearing into the strategy. “You’ve got the advertisement. There is some ominous voice. Everything is kind of dark. Just letting you know that somebody is coming to get you. That our values are at risk if you vote for Ralph. They don’t really tell you exactly why. We have seen it before. And it is a tactic that shows Ralph’s opponent does not think highly of Virginians.”

Northam, a former Army doctor and pediatric neurologist, is in a neck-and-neck race with Gillespie, a former lobbyist and GOP strategist. “I don’t think that someone who spent his life performing surgery on soldiers and children is suddenly cozying up to street gangs,” Obama said to laughter from the crowd of 7,500 at the city’s convention center. “That strains credulity. That sounds like a fib. Sounds like an okey-doke. Nobody believes that.”


Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/virginia-politics/obama-saw-gillespies-ms-13-ads--and-tore-into-them-as-cynical-as-politics-gets/2017/10/20/e98b7d9e-b548-11e7-be94-fabb0f1e9ffb_story.html

[hibbing]

1. Thank you President Obama

Sounds like he's trying the racist strategy that the current person in the White House used.


Peace

[IronLionZion]

2. Virginia has been getting more diverse, I hope racism backfires badly

like it did for George Allen years ago where he used racist terms to describe an Indian-American campaign worker for Jim Webb.

Virginia doesn't have any sanctuary cities. So the ad is basically stating that if you vote for this liberal, he'll somehow be so soft and weak as to let dangerous brown people come after your white children. As if there aren't plenty of brown voters in Virginia these days.

“I don’t think that someone who spent his life performing surgery on soldiers and children is suddenly cozying up to street gangs,”

[mopinko]

3. sure hope he is right

that nobody believes that.
i dunno.

[angrychair]

4. Thank you Mr. President

Fuck that republican lobbyist stooge Gillespie

[Sunlei]

5. Republicans run lobbyists/GOP strategy employees. Don't understand how anyone can vote for that.