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July 2009
Rep. Tom Perriello: TV station rejects anti-Perriello ad
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"A Roanoke, Va. TV station has rejected an ad attacking freshman Democratic Rep. Tom Perriello -- after a fact checking organization reported that the ad relied on potentially bogus stats.

The National Republican Congressional Committee had drafted ads against a number of vulnerable Democrats across the country, including Perriello, who represents a rural-traditionally Republican district in south central Virginia.

The ad plays up Perriello's vote in favor of the climate change bill, which Republicans deride as a national energy tax that would make American energy bills go up significantly.

But Factcheck.org says the NRCC ad is misleading because it claims energy costs could go up nearly $1,800 a year per household, a number gleaned from a widely debunked estimate from the conservative Heritage Foundation.

The widely respected CBO puts the increase at closer to $175 per annum by 2020.

FactCheck.org Analysis

The National Republican Congressional Committee has released a new ad attacking Democratic Rep. Tom Perriello of Virginia for voting with “(Barack) Obama and Nancy Pelosi” for the Waxman-Markey energy bill. It’s part of a broader effort to target several Democratic members.

The ad says the bill will result in lost jobs and cost “middle class families” $1,870 a year. That sounds pretty dire, until you consider that this week we posted an item about the Office of the Republican Whip Eric Cantor’s claim that the same bill would “impose a national energy tax of up to $3,100.” So is the cost of the legislation going down? Did the NRCC make a mistake in its math?

Hardly. While it may seem curious that House Republicans would flog two different cost figures for the proposed legislation, it is indicative of the difficulty in determining how a cap on carbon emissions could affect Americans’ electricity bills. The NRCC ad credits a Washington Times editorial for its claim that the Waxman-Markey bill would make electricity prices “skyrocket,” costing families $1,870 a year. But the NRCC is wrong.

The Washington Times editorial took the figure from a Heritage Foundation analysis that concluded “the GDP hit in 2020 was $161 billion (2009 dollars). For a family of four, that is $1,870.” But a decrease in gross domestic product is a different calculation than an increase in electricity costs.

What’s surprising is that the Heritage Foundation actually did calculate the increase in household energy bills, which the NRCC could have used instead. Heritage estimated that “the typical family of four will see its direct energy costs rise by $1,241 per year” by 2035. We’ll note that the Heritage Foundation is a conservative think tank, and its analysts have been vocal in opposition to a cap and trade plan. And, as we’ve said before, other groups have come to different conclusions. For instance, the nonprofit advocacy group American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy has estimated the legislation “could save $750 per household by 2020 and $3,900 per household by 2030.” (As the name suggests, however, the group is in favor of action to reduce climate change.)

Even within the government there are varying estimates of how the cap and trade legislation would affect American families. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office projects that the bill would cost households an average of $175 in 2020. And the Environmental Protection Agency ran a range of test cases that projected average household energy expenditures (excluding gasoline) would go up several hundred dollars.

{Justin Bank, FactCheck.org. July 2nd, 2009}

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee says the Roanoke TV station, WDBJ, has yanked the ad. The NRCC says the ad may still run after being tweaked.

"One station has temporarily pulled the ad," an NRCC source said. "The station manager has also informed us that he plans to notify the DCCC about their mischaracterization of what exactly has transpired. The ad is still set to run on the other stations in the local market."

Regardless, the Democrats are getting a good ride out of this -- and it could seriously compromise the GOP's capacity to use the attack moving forward.

"The NRCC has a track record of running ads so deceptive and misleading that local TV stations refuse to air them or have to remove from the airwaves,” said Jessica Santillo, Southern Regional Press Secretary. “Clearly, Washington Republicans realize that the truth is not on their side so they resort to deceptive and false attack ads. Virginians deserve to hear the facts about how this bill will reduce our dependence on foreign oil, not be subject to scare tactics.”

UPDATE: POLITICO's Alex Isenstadt caught up with the general manager of the TV station:

Jeffrey Marks, General Manager of WDBJ-7, confirmed that the station was not currently scheduled to air the NRCC ad blasting Perriello.

Marks declined to say why the station was not running the ad, and he refused to say whether the station had made the determination that the spot blasting Perriello for his energy vote – which includes President Obama – was misleading.

“We have no public statement about whether it is misleading or false,” Marks told POLITICO Thursday evening. “We simply don’t talk about that.”

Marks said Perriello representatives complained shortly after the NRCC submitted the ad to the station. Marks said the ad then underwent a review, but he would not be more specific.

Marks did not say how much the NRCC intended to spend in airing the ad on the station." (Glenn Thrush, Politico.com, July 2, 2009)

Comments? Questions? Write me at george@loper.org.