U.S. budget chairman John Spratt is facing criticism after his communications director apologized – and then declined to apologize – for a controversial comment about the electability of Osama bin Laden as a GOP candidate in South Carolina’s fifth congressional district.
In an article published this week by The (Columbia, S.C.) Free Times, Spratt communications director Wayne Wingate said that “if Osama bin Laden ran in this district as a Republican, he would get 38 to 40 percent of the vote in any election year.”
According to The Rock Hill Herald, Wingate confirmed that he made the remark while walking alongside Congressman Spratt at a local festival in York County.
From the Herald‘s coverage:
Wingate issued an apology after being contacted by The Herald Thursday night. He said the story in The Free Times quoted him accurately.
“I am deeply sorry if anyone was offended by it,” he said. “If it detracts in any way from John Spratt, I regret saying it.”
Yeah … we’ll let you parse that statement for its “apology value.”
According to The Sumter Item, however, Wingate wasn’t apologizing …
A day after the comment was published, Wingate said he was standing by his words.
“When I said it, I was just thinking of the most unlikable person someone could imagine,” Wingate said Thursday. “I was trying to say it really didn’t matter who the Republicans ran. They’d just vote for whoever the Republican candidate was.”
Spratt, who was standing next to Wingate when he made the remark, refused to comment to either paper.
Local and state Republican leaders were up in arms, however.
“It is hard to decide what is more troubling in this case – the fact that Spratt’s consultants cannot get their story straight about whether to apologize, or the fact that Spratt was standing right beside his aide when this was said, and did nothing to disagree,” SCGOP Chairwoman Karen Floyd said in a statement.
Meanwhile Sumter County GOP chairman Braden Bunch told The Item that “to me, he’s saying we don’t care about who our candidates are, and that’s ridiculous. It’s really kind of insulting to the people of Sumter and the entire 5th district. It’s sad that folks saying they’re representing us would make such a rude and insulting comparison.”
S.C. Senator Mick Mulvaney has remained quiet about the comment, with a campaign spokesman merely questioning its proximity to next week’s ninth anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks, which bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda terrorist organization masterminded.
By York Voter September 3, 2010 at 11:14 am
Well that what you get when hire a guy who used to run a bagel shop in Rock Hill as your communications guy in a major campaign. The real question to me is why Spratt has put together such a ragtag team of incompentents to run in the toughest campaign of his career. What he should do is dismiss Wingate today.
By /b/ September 3, 2010 at 12:24 pm
“The real question to me is why Spratt has put together such a ragtag team of incompetents to run in the toughest campaign of his career.”
Agreed.
Of course what Wingate said is dead accurate. Let’s be real. This is identity politics and either side would cheerfully piss on the grave of their opponent.
THAT would make for some hilarious video.
By OhNoNotAgain September 3, 2010 at 2:48 pm
Spratt has now denounced the comment. No word on what is happening with the aide.
http://www.heraldonline.com/2010/09/03/2425678/spratt-spokesman-apologizes-for.html