Biden, Sanders release competing ads on Social Security
January 21, 2020
Simmering tensions between Democratic presidential candidates Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden reached new levels Tuesday after the pair released competing attack ads over the former vice president's record on Social Security.
In a short ad released Tuesday night, Biden's team accused Sanders of levying false and negative attacks on the former vice president for supposedly advocating for rollbacks to Social Security. Biden has had a record of entertaining cuts to the keystone program as a senator and vice president — a point Sanders' campaign has returned to numerous times since before the January primary debate.
Biden's team argues he plans to expand Social Security if he were to win the White House. The Biden ad cited instances of the former vice president defending Social Security under the Obama administration and ended with a common refrain that he is the best equipped to beat President Donald Trump.
"As Democrats, we can't launch dishonest attacks against fellow Democrats," the ad said. "Bernie's campaign is not telling the truth."
I've been fighting to protect — and expand — Social Security for my whole career. Any suggestion otherwise is just flat-out wrong. pic.twitter.com/KWIIJgFqGk
— Joe Biden (Text Join to 30330) (@JoeBiden) January 22, 2020
In response, Sanders' campaign manager Faiz Shakir said in a statement: “Joe Biden just released the first negative ad of the 2020 Democratic primary, and let’s be clear about why: he’s trying to distort his decades-long record of proposing and voting for cuts to Social Security benefits for millions of people. Joe Biden is no defender of Social Security, and a negative ad won’t help him outrun his record.”
Sanders' team also released their own video highlighting a recording of Biden in 1995 advocating to freeze federal spending in Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.
"Let’s be honest, Joe. One of us fought for decades to cut Social Security, and one of us didn’t. But don’t take it from me. Take it from you," Sanders tweeted.
Let’s be honest, Joe. One of us fought for decades to cut Social Security, and one of us didn’t. But don’t take it from me. Take it from you. pic.twitter.com/qh7qb1Hmcl
— Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders) January 22, 2020
The growing tension between the two has already faced some major bumps in the past few days. Biden incorrectly accused Sanders on Saturday of issuing a "doctored" video to attack him on Social Security. Sanders' campaign did assert Biden had supported former House Speaker Paul Ryan for cuts to Medicare and Social Security (which was marked false by PolitiFact), but the video was not altered by the Sanders campaign.
Sanders also had to apologize to Biden for an op-ed written by a supporter and redistributed by his campaign that called Biden "corrupt." The op-ed by Zephyr Teachout, a progressive law professor, was published in The Guardian on Monday and included in Sanders' campaign newsletter.
“It is absolutely not my view that Joe Biden is corrupt in any way. And I’m sorry that that op-ed appeared,” Sanders later said. Biden thanked him for the apology afterward in a tweet.
Source: https://www.politico.com/
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