TITLE: "Jobs for China."
LENGTH: 30 seconds
PAID FOR BY: Ron Johnson For Senate campaign
AIRING: Statewide.
SCRIPT: Narrator: Russ Feingold ... desperate running a misleading, negative campaign. Feingold says one thing, does another. Feingold voted the party line. For the stimulus bill that allowed US tax dollars to go to foreign companies ...to create manufacturing jobs overseas. Democrat Senators said the bill would create 3,000 jobs in China alone. For 30 years, Ron Johnson has created manufacturing jobs right here in Wisconsin.
Johnson: I'm Ron Johnson. I approved this message.
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KEY IMAGES:
A slow-motion picture of Feingold speaking at a podium. A newspaper headline from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that calls one of Feingold's television ads "misleading." Pictures of an abandoned factory flash as "Russ Feingold - Obama-Pelosi Stimulus Bill" is shown in type on the screen. Then the words "create ...3,000 jobs in China" and a citation are shown. Last, Johnson is shown in a factory setting talking to workers.
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Analysis:
The ad uses misleading language to suggest Feingold voted for a bill on a party line that created 3,000 jobs in China. That did not happen.
The Johnson campaign says the ad is referring to a wind farm project that plans to erect 240 huge Chinese-manufactured wind turbines on 36,000 acres in West Texas. The proposal was announced last year as a joint venture between the U.S. Renewable Energy Group, Cielo Wind Power LP and China's Shenyang Power Group. The plan would create an estimated 2,000 to 3,000 jobs in China making turbines and hundreds of jobs in the U.S. installing them.
At the time of the announcement, a Cielo official said the stimulus was responsible for promoting wind energy projects because it created a "strong policy push and a recovering financing environment." A U.S. Renewable Energy official said the venture planned to tap stimulus funding for alternative energy projects.
Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York other Democratic senators urged the administration not to fund the project earlier this year, saying the money should not go to create Chinese jobs. But so far, the project has not applied for or received any stimulus cash, Feingold's campaign notes.
The American Wind Energy Association says the stimulus law requires all grants to be used only to finance projects that are built in the U.S. In fact, some of the funding has helped Oshkosh-based Renewegy, a wind turbine manufacturer.
Feingold did vote for the stimulus, but it was not on a party line: it passed with the support of three Republicans. He chided Johnson at last week's debate for his opposition to the stimulus law, noting it was creating jobs in his hometown, mentioning Renewegy.
Feingold's campaign called Johnson's ad a "desperate move" and said trade agreements that Johnson supports have shipped jobs overseas.
The ad's use of China is part of a national trend. The New York Times reported Sunday that several candidates were using China to attack their opponents in a barrage of television ads. The paper said the ads appeal to Americans who are worried the U.S. is slipping as a world power and concerned that China will dominate.
