Rand Paul's controversial history regarding civil rights is put into the spotlight with this new ad by Charles Booker. "The very person who compared expanded health care to slavery. The person who said he would have opposed the Civil Rights Act. The person who singlehandedly blocked an antilynching act from being federal law," says Booker in the ad.
Anyone who thought Charles Booker was going to run a conservative, careful campaign against the human excrement known as Rand Paul would have that notion dispelled after watching this ad. Whether or not it resonates with enough Kentucky voters remains to be seen, however.
Source: Courier-Journal
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Charles Booker stands with a noose around his neck in a new campaign ad criticizing his opponent, Republican incumbent Rand Paul, for holding up legislation in 2020 that would have made lynching a federal hate crime in America.
The certain-to-be-controversial ad, which Booker's campaign released Wednesday morning, includes a content warning for "strong imagery."
It does not mention that Paul went on to co-sponsor a new (and bipartisan) version of that legislation. The Senate unanimously voted this March to pass the updated Emmett Till Antilynching Act, which is now law.
"The pain of our past persists to this day," Booker says in a voiceover as his ad begins, showing a historic lynching photo and a noose hanging from the limb of a tree. "In Kentucky, like many states throughout the South, lynching was a tool of terror. It was used to kill hopes for freedom.
"It was used to kill my ancestors," Booker says as he appears onscreen, standing next to a tree with a noose looped around his neck.
"Now, in a historic victory for our commonwealth, I have become the first Black Kentuckian to receive the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate."
