Republicans, others attack Democratic ad they say lumps immigrants in with terrorists

Republican Hispanics and others are blasting a Democratic group for a political ad they say unfairly compares Hispanic immigrants to terrorists.

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee ran an ad on its Web site that shows footage of two apparently undocumented immigrants scaling a border fence, along with images of Osama Bin Laden and North Korea’s leader, according to an Associated Press article that you can read via the Albuquerque Journal.

Pedro Celis, chairman of the Republican National Hispanic Assembly, called the ad “appalling” and said the Democratic group should remove it, according to the Associated Press.

Republicans aren’t the only ones upset. A Democratic city councilwoman from Houston is among those calling for the ad to be removed from the group’s Web site.

La Raza is upset, too.

“This is the same kind of fear mongering we condemn in the extreme media and now we are seeing it at the DSCC,” Lisa Navarrete, spokeswoman for the National Council of La Raza, told the Associated Press. “It’s appalling.”

I can’t find the ad on the group’s site, so they may have already removed it.

The ad opens with the words “Security Under Bush and GOP?” and shows scenes of a masked man with a bazooka, terrorist attacks, police inspecting a subway car, and terrorist leaders, according to the Associated Press, and it claims “4 times as many terrorist attacks in 2005.”

Then it shows two people climbing a border fence and displays the words “millions more illegal immigrants,” followed by the words “North Korea has quadrupled its nuclear arsenal” with footage of that nation’s leader.

“The faces of the people climbing over the fence are not clearly visible and there is nothing in the ad confirming the people in the ad are Hispanic,” the Associated Press reported. “Such scenes are often captured in footage of the U.S.-Mexican border.”

The ad ends with the words, “Feel safer? Vote for change,” according to the Associated Press.

“Equating these undocumented migrants to the very real threats of terrorism is inexcusable and only serves to fan the flames of anti-immigrant sentiment in our country,” Celis said in the statement to the Associated Press.

The Democratic group’s spokesman, Phil Singer, dismissed criticism as a Republican group “trying to gloss over the White House’s abysmal record on security,” according to the Associated Press. “This group’s time would be better spent pressuring reluctant Republicans to support comprehensive immigration reform.”