‘[We] reject these banal attempts to abuse the legal process and shut down grassroots-driven political speech your firm disagrees with…’
(Claire Russel, Liberty Headlines) A pro-Trump super-PAC rejected former President Barack Obama’s demand that it remove an ad featuring past comments he made criticizing the “plantation politics” of insincere politicians like former Vice President Joe Biden.
The ad, called “Enough Empty Promises,” is a “lawful expression of political speech,” the Committee to Defend the President wrote in a letter responding to Obama.
Obama had sent a cease-and-desist letter to the super PAC through his law firm, Perkins Coie, alleging that the ad misconstrues his words to negatively portray Biden’s candidacy.
The ad features excerpts from Obama’s 1995 memoir and makes it seem as though Obama is criticizing Biden. Obama’s attorneys warned the group that the ad was an “unauthorized use” of Obama’s “name, image, likeness, voice and book passage.”
The Republican super PAC, however, said the “use of Obama’s recording clearly critiques and comments on the issues surrounding Democratic politics in relation to the African–American community.”
“[We] reject these banal attempts to abuse the legal process and shut down grassroots-driven political speech your firm disagrees with, as doing so is wholly un-American. Our commitment to free political speech is absolute,” the group said.
“Thus, in response to your outrageous attempt to disrupt the sharing of political ideas you disagree with to African American voters, CDP will not only refuse to take ‘Enough Empty Promises’ down but will distribute this advertisement to an additional 50,000 South Carolina Democratic primary voters.”
Katie Hill, an Obama spokeswoman, said last week that the group’s “despicable” ad is “straight out of the Republican disinformation playbook,” according to CNN.
She clarified that Obama has no plans to endorse Biden or any of the other Democratic candidates just yet, but said Obama will oppose any effort to “suppress turnout among minority voters in South Carolina.”