To the editor: Pro-Scott Super-PAC ad skewers truth

Recently, a Political Action Committee has begun investing heavily into Gov. Phil Scott’s campaign for reelection. This super PAC — A Stronger Vermont, which has ties to the national Republican Governors Association — has recently invested over $460,000 into advertising for Scott, according to reports filed with our Vermont’s Secretary of State’s Office.

It was reported that the same organization spent more than $2.8 million to help him get elected governor for the first time in 2016.

The ethics, or lack thereof, of this super PAC’s style of advertising can be debated until the cows come home, but two aspects of this particular ad campaign are hard to ignore: It makes a feeble attempt to cast a negative light on Amanda Janoo with quotes from Democrats – one of them her opponent in the primaries – that were made prior to Janoo becoming the Democratic nominee; and, conversely, it tries to shine a favorable light on Scott with statements that don’t bear up under even a modest amount of scrutiny.

The most boldface of these are that the governor is known to bring people together, and that he works across the aisle. Those assertions may have come as a surprise to even Phil Scott himself, since he has taken to repeatedly blaming the Democratic supermajority – which only existed for two of Scott’s 10-year tenure – for all of Vermont’s current ills, and governing by vetoes and executive orders.

There is a lot of daylight between describing Scott as bipartisan and the reality of his endless finger-pointing and his “My way or the highway” style of governing.

One could rightly point out that the governor — or any politician for that matter — has no control over what PACs put out into the media, but in a recent VTDigger article on the matter, Scott said, “he would prefer to ‘just run our own campaign and do the best we can with giving our own message.’ But he also said he did not have an issue with the ad that featured Janoo. ‘I don’t like the negative campaigning. But I thought it struck the right balance. It seems to be palatable,’ he said.”

So he says he doesn’t like negative campaigning, but is OK with this ad. Hard to square that circle.

Many people, myself included, see the massive amounts of money invested into elections since Citizens United opened those floodgates as an affront, and to use those monies to present blatant falsehoods as fact only serves to rub salt into that wound.

The end of the Stronger Vermont ad characterizes Scott as “Proven. Effective. Bipartisan.” The only thing he has proven to be effective at has been undermining our public education system, and to cast him as bipartisan implies Vermonters – regardless of political affiliation – have been living in caves.

Ken Fredette 
Wallingford