A Spanish-language McCain radio ad gets nearly all its facts wrong.

[kevinmc]

factcheck.org

Summary
McCain's new radio ad, in Spanish, aims to show Florida would benefit from the Colombia Free Trade Agreement, which he supports. But every number in the ad is wrong, except one, a prediction of job gains taken from a group favoring the trade deal. And even that number is rounded upward so generously as to flunk third-grade arithmetic.

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McCain Radio Ad: "Colombia Trade"

Tony Villamil: This is Tony Villamil speaking, ex-director of Tourism, Commerce and Economic Affairs of Florida.

When it comes to a strong economy for our state, commercial trade with Latin America is crucial. Three-quarters of Florida's exports are with Latin America, and the Colombian Free Trade Agreement
would create even more opportunity.

In this election, there are some that talk about revising the Free Trade Agreement with Mexico and Canada and oppose the Agreement with Colombia. This would hurt our economic future.

Last year Florida's exports to Latin America reached almost $45 billion dollars. Colombia is Florida's third most important export market and this trade agreement would create almost 5,000 new jobs.

John McCain supports the Colombian Agreement, knows about our alliances with our hemisphere and understands our economy grows thanks to trade.
Remember who stands for prosperity in Florida, our country and our hemisphere. His name is John McCain.

John McCain: I'm John McCain and I approve this message.

************************

The false figures begin with the ad's claim that "three-quarters of Florida's exports are with Latin America." That's wrong. According to the trade statistics generator from the U.S. Department of Commerce, all of Florida's international exports totaled close to $45 billion dollars in 2007, and the state's exports to Latin America AND the Caribbean last year equaled nearly $24 billion. That means 53 percent of Florida's exports go to the region, much closer to half than three-quarters. Exports to Latin America by itself would be even smaller.

This also means the ad's assertion that "last year, Florida's exports to Latin America reached almost 45 billion dollars" is false. As we just pointed out, that was the figure for the state's exports to all countries, not just Latin America.

Finally, the ad trips up when it claims: "Colombia is Florida's third most important export market." While we don't know how to measure the "importance" of a market, we can quantify the dollar value of exports sent to each. And by that metric, Colombia ranks fifth – not third – in Florida exports, according to figures from the Commerce Department, as well as from the Census Bureau. But McCain should know this already, because he said it himself on May 20, in an article he wrote for Miami's Latin Business Chronicle.

McCain, Latin Business Chronicle, May 20, 2008: Colombia today stands as Florida's fifth largest export market – Florida exported $2.1 billion worth of goods there last year – and now the Colombians are offering to drop their barriers to American goods.

We contacted the McCain campaign repeatedly about the figures used in the ad but received no answer as to where the campaign's numbers came from and why they differed so much from the Commerce Department's statistics. We also called Florida's Department of Finance, but a spokeswoman there could only point us to federal agencies for numbers on trade.


The campaign did give us support for one claim in the ad, a line saying that "this trade agreement would create almost 5,000 new jobs." That prediction, however, comes from a group promoting the agreement, and it doesn't really support what the ad says. Enterprise Florida, a nonprofit partnership between business leaders and state government that promotes economic development in the state, estimated in 2006 that a trade agreement with Colombia could lead to an "additional 4,483 jobs" in the state. That's actually closer to 4,000 jobs than to 5,000.

Even the 4,483 figure is suspect. For one thing, it is an estimate only of jobs gained from increased exports, without any offset for jobs possibly lost. Furthermore, a more recent report from the International Trade Commission found that the trade agreement was likely to have "minimal to no effect on output or employment for most sectors in the U.S. economy."

We take no stance on the trade agreement itself. But voters should not be misled by the fanciful figures and bad math in this ad.

[NattPang]

1. Ooh! He's busted.

[Igel]

2. I'm staying agnostic.

Why?

Because I ran into a separate set of numbers that seemed to be relying on exports of Florida production, not export from Florida ports. I couldn't find a site that actually listed them, by year, with a by-country breakdown. Hence "seemed", which shows that I have little confidence in the numbers themselves.

However, I do have confidence that there are two sets of numbers, one for origin of movement (which is relatively easy to quantify) and origin of production, so I'm agnostic wrt Factcheck's claims. Factcheck's sources specifically warn against assuming that the numbers they cite, for origin of movement, bear any known relationship to where the exports are produced.

The difference is relatively simple. It's the difference between where the product's shipped and where it's made. Let's consider two companies, Big Company A and Little Company B.

Big Company A is based in Georgia, produces $500 million of bilingual widgets in Georgia and sells them in Haiti. BC A uses Florida shipping facilities. When you look at numbers for origin of movement, that $500 million gets credited to Florida: $500 million in exports from Florida to Haiti, $0 from Georgia to Haiti. When you look at origin of production, the numbers are flipped: Florida gets no export "credit" to Haiti, and Georgia gets $500 million. Now, if we're going to do something to increase trade with Haiti, Florida would benefit slightly from it, since it would provide the shipping facilities; but the real benefit would be in Georgia. Those are the numbers I'd want to use in a commercial, because those are the ones that would make my case.

Little Company A is based in the Florida panhandle and makes $50k of stuff that gets shipped to Columbia, but it ships its wares to Mobile for export. Alabama gets credit for the $50k as far as origin of movement goes, not Florida, but if something happens to triple LC A's shipments, it would be Florida that really benefits.

Factcheck relies exclusively on origin of movement figures. If I were going to dig up numbers, those are the ones I'd run across immediately, and the ones I'd want to use to fact-check McCain.

I'm agnostic, but it strikes me as unlikely that both the Colombian figures for Florida origin-of-production exports and its overall origin-of-movement figures are just at $45 billion. But I don't know just how unlikely. It strikes me as possible that Colombia's ranking as trading partner would change from #3 to #5--not necessary, but possible, and one website cites Colombia as #3 (without stating the year, however). It's not a big difference. As for any difference in origin-of-movement vs origin-of-production numbers for exports to Latin America, $23 billion or so strikes me as rather too large. But in the absence of actual relevant numbers, I can't make a judgment.

As with most things, the devil's in the details--if there's a devil--but often details contain no devils. Factcheck dug up details and found a devil, but the devil may actual be in Factcheck's details. And figuring out where the devil jumped out from is, well, hell.