PoliGraph: DCCC ad exaggerates shutdown facts
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The battle for control of the U.S. House is playing out in Minnesota’s 7
th
Congressional District, where groups backing Republicans and Democrats have dueling ads up this week.
After the National Republican Congressional Committee dropped six figures on an ad targeting incumbent DFL Rep. Collin Peterson earlier this month, its foe the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee fired back with an ad blasting Peterson’s Republican opponent, state Sen. Torrey Westrom of Elbow Lake.
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“Westrom led the charge to shutdown Minnesota’s government. Why? Because he wouldn’t let go of tax breaks for millionaires. Westrom’s shutdown cost Minnesota almost $60 million. Almost 20,000 Minnesotans were out of the work. And the whole time, Torrey Westrom kept his taxpayer funded paycheck.”
This ad leans toward misleading for leaving out some important facts.
The Evidence
The 2011 government shutdown happened because Gov. Mark Dayton and the Republican controlled Legislature could not agree on a budget to close the state’s $5 billion deficit. Dayton wanted to raise taxes on Minnesota’s top earners (which he did in the last legislative session), but Republicans objected.
It’s easy to argue both sides of this issue: Republicans say Dayton forced a shutdown by sticking to his plan to raise taxes and refusing to accept the budget they passed. Democrats say the Republican budget cut too much.
At the time, Westrom was serving in the Minnesota House and was a member of his party’s leadership team as Speaker Pro Tempore.
While Westrom wasn’t the only GOP legislator standing their ground on the Republican budget as the ad implies, he did back his party’s actions before and during the shutdown. On July 1, 2011, he wrote to the Alexandria Echo Press to defend the Republican budget that Dayton rejected.
“The Legislature passed a balanced budget in May that increased current spending by $2 billion, with a total of $34 billion, a 6 percent increase in spending this year,” Westrom wrote. “A 6 percent increase should be enough; we cannot spend more than we have in the checkbook.”
It’s true that the shutdown cost the state about $60 million. But the ad leaves out the fact that those costs were offset by about $65 million the state saved when it laid off nearly 20,000 government employees during the shutdown.
Like most of his House colleagues, Westrom accepted pay during the shutdown as well.
The Verdict
The DCCC ad leans toward misleading for two reasons.
First, it somewhat overstates Westrom's role in the government shutdown. It goes a bit too far by saying "Westrom led the charge to shutdown Minnesota's government," though Westrom was a member of leadership at the time and backed his party.
And while it's true the shutdown cost about $65 million, the ad leaves out the critical fact that the state recouped those costs - and then some.