ADVERTISEMENT

GOP Ad Spotlights Clintons' Controversial History on Racial Rhetoric

February 22, 2016

The Republican National Committee released a new ad Monday showing controversial comments Hillary Clinton made on race during the 2008 presidential race.

The ad starts with an interview she had with the late Tim Russert, who was the host of Meet The Press. The interview was in January 2008.

"When we arrived in South Carolina yesterday, this was The State newspaper, ‘Clinton Camp Hits Obama: Attacks ‘painful’ for black voters: Many in state offended by criticism of Obama and remarks about Martin Luther King,’" Russert said.

"Dr. King's dream began to be realized when President Lyndon Johnson passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964," Clinton said in a clip which Russert was referencing.

"It's as if you are minimizing ‘I Have a Dream’, it's a nice sentiment, but it took a white president to get blacks to the mountaintop," Russert said.

"Sen. Obama's support among hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening," Clinton says in another interview.

The ad then points out controversial comments about Obama made by former President Bill Clinton.

Geraldine Ferraro, a supporter of Hillary Clinton has her own controversial comments raised in the ad. A reporter reads her quote about Obama in the 2008 campaign.

"If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position."

The release of this ad comes at a critical time for Clinton, as she has been aggressively courting the crucial African-American vote during her current primary contest against Sen. Bernie Sanders, who has also been attempting to win more minority voters.