While businessman Jeff Brown and his allied super PAC have been running ads utilizing old footage of Michelle Obama praising him, the former first lady’s team made it clear late last week that she’s not happy about her involuntary insertion into May’s nine-way Democratic primary for mayor in Philadelphia. “For any candidate looking to earn the public’s trust, manipulating old appearances that are out of context to suggest an endorsement is disappointing,” an Obama advisor told the Philadelphia Inquirer, adding, “Mrs. Obama does not get involved in Democratic primaries and is not supporting this candidate.”
Reporter Anna Orso explains that Brown, who owns several locations of the ShopRite grocery store chain, has run commercials showing him with Obama in 2010 and 2011 as she praised his work opening stores in underserved communities. The viewer at the end of a Brown spot sees Obama speaking on a stage and saying, “I commend you for your leadership and for doing what’s best for the people of this city,” but Orso says this footage appears to have been edited in a small but crucial way. The first lady, according to the event’s transcript, was addressing both Brown and another grocer when she really said, “I commend both of you for your leadership and for doing what’s best for the people of this city.” (Emphasis added.)
Obama’s comments condemning the ads came about a week after Ernest Owens reported in The Daily Beast that she’d communicated her displeasure to Brown, though that article did not mention the edit Orso flags. The candidate’s spokesperson defended the spots to Owens, saying, “The Jeff Brown ad featuring former First Lady Michelle Obama included content that was publicly available and in the public domain. It included comments former First Lady Obama made about Jeff Brown’s work on developing solutions to the national food desert crisis.” Brown’s team says the ad hasn’t aired in weeks, though it remains online as of Monday.
Owens also pointed out that this isn’t the first time that Brown’s messaging has resulted in the wrong type of attention. The candidate, who is white, last month posted a video on Instagram showing Black Philadelphians extolling him, with one saying, “In our communities, we have people called grandmoms. We call them ‘Big Ma,’ where they can give you a hug or give you a meal. And that’s the kind of energy that Mr. Brown gives off.” That same speaker later appears with Brown and says, “One thing about God is, He’s always going to have your back no matter how hard it gets, and so will Mr. Brown. And I thank you for being a like-image.”
The video, which Brown later took down, did not mention that the speaker used to work at ShopRite, though the campaign insists, “No individuals who participated or are featured in our campaign social media posts were compensated. They are all volunteers who offered their candid comments.” Owens, who is Black, had problems with the message that went well beyond its failure to disclose this, though. “As a city that’s majority Black and brown, Philadelphia deserves better than this type of pandering and insulting politics,” Owens wrote in Philadelphia Magazine, concluding, “For God’s (or Big Ma’s) sake: Kill the white savior routine, Jeff Brown.”
Brown isn’t the only candidate running for mayor who had a tough week, however. Former City Councilmember Helen Gym was one of the many Philadelphia Democrats who denounced the prominent Union League club for giving Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis its top award, but she herself had to apologize after she attended a different event at the Union League days later. She tweeted Tuesday night, “Earlier this evening, I made a stop at the annual meeting of an event that I have attended in the past. It was a mistake. I apologize for attending.”
Republished with permission from Daily Kos.
