Ellmore Campaign Mailer Makes a False Statement
This evening I received a copy of the above mailer from the Singh campaign (which told me that one of its staffers received it in the mail today). Several quotes and positions are attributed to interviews published here at Blacknell.net. Of singular concern to me is the first bulleted statement on the top left of the mailer – “Amit said he will not vote for John McCain in November – Interview with Blacknell.net 3/26/08″. Nowhere on Blacknell.net will you find any statement or quote from Amit Singh that even gets close to implying such a thing, and at no time in my interview with Amit Singh did he make such a statement. The Ellmore campaign mailer is – in a word – false.
Political candidates are free, of course, to argue over and characterize each other’s positions as they please. They are not, however, entitled to make demonstrably false statements and source those statements to third parties such as myself. At the moment, if any voter who has received this mailing decides to look further into its claims by coming to Blacknell.net, the Ellmore campaign has created a situation in which it appears that one of us is lying (the campaign by its claim about what can be found here, or me at Blacknell.net by no such thing being here). This is unacceptable.
The Singh campaign has communicated to me that intends to do all it can to communicate to 8th CD voters that the statement at hand is false. I expect the Ellmore campaign to do the same thing.
(The front of the mailer is here. I personally altered it solely to remove the name of the addressee. That is the only change that has been made.)
Update: The Ellmore campaign contacted me – after some time – and acknowledged that the claim at hand was false, attributing it to a production error (i.e., a mixup while changing the claims and sources on the flier and making the final selection). I’ve pasted the campaign’s statement to that effect in the comments below. There has been much ado over the flier amongst Virginia Republican sites, and if you want details, well, that’s where to go. If you’re more interested in the issues, I have a my final pre-primary piece on the race up here.
Blacknell.net » Interview Roundup for the 8th CD GOP Candidates says:
[...] Please see this post concerning a recent mailer from the Ellmore campaign. You can leave a comment, or trackback from [...]
June 6th, 2008 at 10:03 pm
Jason says:
If this is in fact true, then the Ellmore campaign has some explaining to do. I want both parties to stick to facts.
June 7th, 2008 at 12:09 am
MB says:
Well, Jason, there’s nothing I’ve stated here that isn’t true, and that’s the flyer I received. I asked the Mark Ellmore for an explanation last night around 7pm, and he referred me to Daniel Tillson (his campaign manager). So far, silence from Tillson. If I get something from them, I’ll post it. I’ll have to admit a bit of surprise about the whole thing.
(However, I am traveling for much of the day, so I’m not sure when I’ll be able to update. I encourage any readers with more information about this to post it (or links to it) here. Thanks.)
June 7th, 2008 at 10:39 am
James says:
What i find funny is that in youur interview of him, Ellmore says “I’m not a good liar” Reading your fourth installment with him made me want to laugh and cringe at the same time. This guy better lose on tuesday.
June 7th, 2008 at 2:59 pm
MB says:
I received the following this evening (Saturday) from Daniel Tillson, the campaign manager for Mark Ellmore:
Today the Ellmore campaign discovered that we have incorrectly attributed two quotes in a mailer that was sent this previous week. This was due to a last minute swap before sending off to press and it was brought to our attention and immediately we reviewed our records. We have taken steps to rectify the situation and we intended no harm to Mr. Blacknell or anyone else affected. This is not typical of the Ellmore campaign or our high standards. We stand by our message and believe the voters will look past this mistake. Please direct any questions to 703.344.7349.
~
This doesn’t answer all of the questions raised about the mailer, and there are a couple of things I’d like to add, but this is what I have for now (I’m traveling and my time is obligated to another project through tomorrow afternoon). Jim Hoeft over at Bearingdrift.com looks to be doing a good job on keeping on top of this – check his work out there.
June 8th, 2008 at 12:46 am
Darius says:
So will Amit vote and fully endorse John McCain or is he joining his comrades in arms in trying to steal delegates so Ron Paul can disrupt the convention?
June 8th, 2008 at 12:48 am
Darius says:
Sorry forgot to include the LA Times article about delegate stealing:
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2008/05/ronpaulgop.html
June 8th, 2008 at 1:01 am
Below The Beltway » Blog Archive » Republican Candidate In 8th District Spreads Lies About His Opponent says:
[...] vote for John McCain and attributed the quote to an interview at Blacknell.net. The problem is that Singh said no such thing in the Blacknell interview: This evening I received a copy of the above mailer from the Singh campaign (which told me that one [...]
June 8th, 2008 at 8:02 am
Lies in the 8th Congressional District « Crystal Clear Conservative says:
[...] supporting McCain in November, in fact according to fellow blogger, Blacknell, Singh made no such claim that he would not support McCain. Then, the Ellmore campaign claims that The Washington Post [...]
June 8th, 2008 at 11:17 pm
Don’t Vote Ellmore: Part 6 « Red Virginia says:
[...] Blacknell [...]
June 9th, 2008 at 9:44 am
Ron Paul Blog - Dirty Tricks By Ellmore In VA-8 GOP Primary says:
[...] as Mark Blacknell explains: Nowhere on Blacknell.net will you find any statement or quote from Amit Singh that even [...]
June 9th, 2008 at 1:42 pm
Blacknell.net » The Choice in the 8th Congressional District says:
[...] the the campaign when Ellmore sent out a mailer using Blacknell.net as a source for a charge that turned out to be false and that’s what I spent my available time dealing with, instead. I have little-to-no interest [...]
June 9th, 2008 at 3:06 pm
Ron Paul Blog - Mark Ellmore: Not Republican Enough, or Just an A**hole? says:
[...] So just to summarize: The Ellmore campaign claims it is just incompetent (as opposed to knowingly lying about their opponent Amit Singh), but that doesn’t jive with the facts. [...]
June 9th, 2008 at 6:34 pm
Blacknell.net » Friday Notes: Double Stack Edition says:
[...] First up – I’m big in China! Yes, if you use the Chinese Google to search for “false statements“, I’m right there on the first page of results. Ahead of Bush, Cheney, and the “Criminal Tax Manual”, no less. I couldn’t have done it without Mark Ellmore. [...]
June 27th, 2008 at 1:36 am
Ellmore Drops Race | Bearing Drift: Virginia Politics On Demand says:
[...] Normally I don’t blog about campaigns but Ellmore and myself have a feisty and unpleasant past. We spent the entire election day back in June 2008 yelling at each other due to an intentionally false mailer sent by his campaign in the 11th hour to discredit thousands of volunteer hours and dollars spent to win the election by 700 votes. Perhaps even more telling of his character was his ability to blame his 16 year old campaign manager for mailer sent. [...]
March 10th, 2010 at 8:11 am