A new ad from Claire McCaskill's reelection campaign uses veterans to push back against the attacks leveled against the senator by critics, but it fails to disclose that two of the featured veterans also happen to be Democrats running for office this cycle.
The ad, "Lies," pushes back against a wide range of criticisms, including McCaskill's use of her position in the Senate to help her own family. It opens with a veteran, Sam Gladney, saying he's "checked the facts" on the attacks against McCaskill and they're "just not true."
"You don't have to like her, but know one thing, in the Senate she hasn't done anything to help her family," Gladney says.
Undisclosed is that Gladney is a Democrat who ran this year for the Missouri state legislature but lost in a tight primary. He was also rumored as a possible candidate to run for Congress against Republican representative Ann Wagner.
Also featured in the ad is Mark Osmack, who actually did make a serious run for Wagner's seat, losing in the Democratic primary after spending nearly $200,000, according to the Federal Election Commission.
"All this stuff about raising your utility rates, it's just not true," Osmack says in the ad, which he posted on his campaign's Facebook page.
Neither Gladney's nor Osmack's political campaigns are disclosed in the ad, which simply presents them, along with two others, as veterans who support McCaskill.
Osmack has actively campaigned for McCaskill since his primary loss.
Osmack also said in a March Facebook post that he previously worked for McCaskill, writing, "My time working for [McCaskill] in DC was and is a tremendous honor."
The Free Beacon was unable to find a record of Osmack working for McCaskill, though he did previously work on Capitol Hill for Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D., Ill.) when she was a member of the House.
Osmack did not respond to an inquiry on his past work with McCaskill and whether he thinks his recent political campaign should have been disclosed in the ad. McCaskill's campaign also did not respond to a request for comment.