Erik Paulsen’s Recycled Attacks on Terri Bonoff Reveals Terrified Incumbent
After poll showing him down 2 points, Paulsen airs another negative ad
Down in the polls, Erik Paulsen is out with yet another negative attack ad on his challenger Terri Bonoff that not only reuses previously debunked partisan attacks, but also reveals an incumbent far more worried about losing his seat than he would have the world believe.
Let’s address Paulsen’s misleading attacks one-by-one:
CLAIM 1: “Terri Bonoff turned a $2 billion surplus into a $6 billion deficit.”
TRUTH: Paulsen’s supposed surpluses and deficits are only guesses; Minnesota is constitutionally obligated to balance the budget. And in fact, during Terri Bonoff’s tenure in the State Senate, Minnesota balanced the budget every cycle.
CLAIM 2: “Terri Bonoff voted for a new luxury office building for politicians.”
TRUTH: Bonoff actually voted against the luxury office building Paulsen references. The vote Paulsen cites in his attack ad was to make sure that the Minnesota government kept running and didn’t default on its debt to pay for the building.
CLAIM 3: “Terri Bonoff gave MNsure bureaucrats bonuses while our health insurance rate skyrocketed.”
TRUTH: This partisan claim was debunked in 2014: “the decision to issue those bonuses was made by former MNsure chief April Todd-Malmlov, not the Legislature.” And not Terri Bonoff.
CLAIM 4: “Terri Bonoff voted to tax nursing homes and seniors got the bill.”
TRUTH: This vote only changed the formula to shift more of the funding obligation to the federal government so that Minnesotans paid less. Furthermore, this never even became law.
“Down in the polls, Erik Paulsen is recycling debunked attacks on Terri Bonoff because he knows his anti-choice, anti-LGBT, and pro-gun views are too extreme for his district,” said DCCC Spokeswoman Sacha Haworth. “Paulsen is hoping to distract from the fact that he still can’t tell Minnesotans how Donald Trump is going to ‘earn his support.’”