Hillary Clinton falsely claimed that Sen. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) has never had a single negative campaign ad run against him during an interview airing Sunday on Meet The Press.
Challenged by host Chuck Todd about Sanders' better numbers in prospective matches with Republican Donald Trump than she has, the Democratic frontrunner fired back that the 2008 campaign where she made a similar case against Barack Obama was a far closer contest.
"It's also fair to say that I have been vetted and tested, and I think that puts me in a very strong position," Clinton said.
"You don't Bernie Sanders has been vetted?" Todd asked. "You don't think this one long year of campaign, your campaign against him has vetted him?"
"Let me say that I don't think he's had a single negative ad ever run against him," Clinton said. "And that's fine, but we know what we're going into, and we understand what it's going to take to win in the fall."
PolitiFact rated the claim "False" in a fact-check Sunday, pointing out examples of ads against Sanders run by super PACs supporting both Clinton and former Democratic candidate Martin O'Malley. Correct The Record, a pro-Clinton outfit, has run at least 13 negative videos about Sanders.
Republican outfits have attacked Sanders as well, such as the pro-Marco Rubio super PAC Future 45.
PolitiFact wrote:
Clinton has a point that compared with her, Sanders hasn’t really felt the burn of negative ad blitzes from Republican groups. But her claim that he hasn’t had "a single ad ever run against him" is an exaggeration.
[...]
The number of attack ads against Sanders pales in comparison to the number against Clinton, but she’s wrong that he’s been completely spared.
Democratic groups, including one supporting Clinton, and Republican outfits alike have gone after Sanders.
We rate her claim False.
Sanders leads Trump by 15 points in a hypothetical race in the new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, while Clinton led by just three. Clinton and Trump both have historically high unfavorability ratings, in spite of being the likely nominees of their parties.
Sanders has vowed to fight for the nomination all the way to the Democratic National Convention, exposing a widening rift within the Democratic Party.