Virginia TV Station Pulls Ad Targeting Boucher

The local ABC television affiliate in Lynchburg (VA) this week pulled an ad run by the conservative third party group Americans for Job Security after Rep Rick Boucher (D-VA) claimed the ads were false and misleading.

At issue is an often cited study by the Washington Post which assigns a "party voting" score that represents the percentage of votes on which a lawmaker agrees with the position taken by a majority of his or her party members. AJS references the study when it claims that "Rick Boucher supports Nancy Pelosi 96 percent of the time" in its ad, which went on the air Sept. 9. But after Boucher's complaint WSET-TV President Randy Smith reviewed the ad and found that the Washington Post study "does not appear to compare votes by Congressman Boucher with those by Ms. Pelosi nor does it equate Ms. Pelosi with the Democratic Party. Hence the ad appears to be misleading." Americans for Job Security bought $416,000 of air time in the 9th district as part of a $3.5 million effort targeting nine Democrats across the country. The group is expected to spend $9 million on television ads through early October. This is the first time a television station has refused to air an AJS ad this cycle.