An ad depicting a rampaging truck driver who supports Virginia's Republican gubernatorial candidate Ed Gillespie has been canceled after a truck attack occurred in New York City, killing eight.
Latino Victory Fund pulled the ad following the truck attack and issued a statement claiming that the ad was able to "ruffle feathers" as they expected. The organization's president Cristóbal J. Alex did not apologize but merely said "events" caused them to remove the ad.
"We knew our ad would ruffle feathers. We held a mirror up to the Republican Party, and they don't like what they see," Alex said. "We have decided to pull our ad at this time."
"Given recent events, we will be placing other powerful ads into rotation that highlight the reasons we need to elect progressive leaders in Virginia," he added.
Latino Victory Fund Statement: pic.twitter.com/VE8T3N3zI2
— Latino Victory (@latinovictoryus) October 31, 2017
Ed Gillespie and his campaign have called this a "new low" for political speech.
https://youtu.be/Uj3pqe24uRA
The Northam campaign has made other moves to turn paint Gillespie's campaign in racially charged terms, including a mailer that drew attention for tying Gillespie to Charlottesville white nationalists.
.@RalphNortham’s campaign reaches a new low: exploiting Charlottesville tragedy to score political points https://t.co/JHJiXyZ5V1 #VAGov pic.twitter.com/4IATNh5Qq0
— Eric Wilson (@ericwilson) October 25, 2017
Former Hillary Clinton campaign official Brian Fallon tweeted a picture of the Charlottesville protest with the caption "Live look at Ed Gillespie campaign strategy meeting."
Live look at Ed Gillespie campaign strategy meeting: pic.twitter.com/izcs57hZUv
— Brian Fallon (@brianefallon) October 27, 2017
The truck driver in New York purposefully drove into pedestrians and crashed into a school bus before he was apprehended by police.
The Washington Post editorial board savaged the ad on Tuesday night, calling it "vile" and saying it was "sad" that it took Tuesday's terrorist attack in New York to wake up the Latino Victory Fund to "how out of bounds its ad was."