Fact checkers across media publications call out NRCC’s “clearly deceptive” attack ad
The Republican Party is clearly not one to care about the facts – and they’re not getting away with it either.
This week, CNN, the Washington Post, and MSNBC called out the NRCC’s blatantly misleading attempt to attack Democrats in Congress and President Biden. According to fact-checkers, the ad employs deeply misleading editing techniques and deceptive claims, including the use of footage from the Trump administration to attack President Biden, proving once again that voters can’t count on the GOP to tell the truth.
“The only jobs Republicans seem to care about keeping safe are fact-checkers who have to constantly call out their lies,” said DCCC Spokesperson Nebeyatt Betre. “While the GOP continues to lie to, scare, and deceive voters to distract from their harmful and extremist agenda, Democrats are busy delivering results to uplift middle class families and workers.”
Take a look at some of the coverage dismantling the NRCC’s lazy and false attack ad:
-
A new national television ad from House Republicans’ campaign arm deceptively uses images of events that occurred during former President Donald Trump’s time in office to attack President Joe Biden’s tenure.
-
Facts First: At least three of the images in the Republican ad were actually taken in 2020, during the Trump administration, not during the Biden administration in 2021.
-
A spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee, Mike Berg, would not tell CNN on Monday which images from the ad were from 2020 and which were from 2021….Berg was unapologetic about the ad’s use of images from 2020.
-
It’s clearly deceptive to throw sensational images from the Trump days into this mix.
Washington Post: NRCC’s deceptively edited attack ad offers a glimpse of 2022 spin
-
…a new ad sponsored by the National Republican Congressional Committee, titled “Chaos,” blurs the line between fact and fiction with misleading video clips. CNN first highlighted some of the deceptive images, and we found additional elements that deceive viewers.
-
When reached for comment, the NRCC did not engage with our questions concerning the discrepancies found in the ad. Instead, NRCC spokesman Mike Berg issued a statement that rested on a falsehood: “If Joe Biden and DC Democrats want to dispute the fact that they actively supported and encouraged the riots in 2020, they are welcome to do so.”
-
There is no evidence Biden or the Democrats “actively supported and encouraged” rioting in 2020. Biden frequently decried the riots.
-
The NRCC willfully misrepresents video of events that occurred well before Biden’s term and selectively edits audio to bolster what the GOP sees as a winning message. We remain dedicated to highlighting manipulated video and so award Four Pinocchios. This ad combines several practices we frown on, including misrepresentation and splicing.
MSNBC: For the GOP’s new attack ad, the truth wasn’t quite good enough
-
In other words, Republicans created an ad intended to tell the public that the United States is a chaotic mess and it’s the Democratic president’s fault. But some of the evidence of violence and social unrest included in the ad occurred during Trump’s term — suggesting the NRCC blames the former Republican president for creating a chaotic mess.
-
That’s funny, but I’m also struck by the fact that the National Republican Congressional Committee needed to play fast and loose with the facts in the first place. If the White House and congressional Democrats are coming up short, shouldn’t the truth be good enough?
###