Labor Group Revives George Allen Racism in New Ad

NYT

As George Allen battles to regain his seat in the United States Senate from Virginia, one important name has not been mentioned — until now.

“Macaca.”

That word — a term that can refer to monkeys — torpedoed Mr. Allen’s re-election campaign in 2006 after he was caught on video using it to describe a young man of Indian descent at a campaign rally. The video instantly went viral online, one of the first such examples on YouTube.

The incident sparked weeks of national news about Mr. Allen’s past, including allegations that the Republican senator had embraced symbols of racial hatred during his political career and in his personal life.

Mr. Allen’s opponent this year, Tim Kaine, the former governor of Virginia, has steered away from all of that, preferring to argue that Mr. Allen’s economic and policy record make him unfit for a return to the Senate.

But now, a labor group backing Mr. Kaine’s election is trying to raise it all again with a series of small, online advertisements that note each of the most unsavory allegations against Mr. Allen. The ads were created by workersvoice.org, a political arm of the A.F.L.-C.I.O.

One notes that Mr. Allen “kept a noose in his office” and shows a picture of Mr. Allen giving a thumbs up next to a hangman’s noose. Mr. Allen has always claimed the noose was a lasso intended to represent cowboys.

Another banner ad says that Mr. Allen hung a Confederate flag in his living room; he said it was a symbol of youthful rebellion. A third ad notes, correctly, that as a member of the Virginia state legislature, he voted against a holiday honoring the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (The state celebrated Lee-Jackson-King Day for 16 years.)

A fourth ad revives the controversy over “macaca” by simply printing that word next to Mr. Allen’s picture.

“George Allen kept a noose and a Confederate flag in his office and anyone who would insult the African-American and Latino people of Virginia this way is not fit to hold office,” said Eddie Vale, the communications director for the group. “This is similar to, but even more offensive, than Mitt Romney secretly attacking 47 percent of all Americans.”

Emily Davis, a spokeswoman for Mr. Allen, said in a statement: “It is disappointing to see that Tim Kaine and his union allies would stoop to this level rather than talk about the very serious issues facing Virginia families and small businesses. George Allen has apologized and forthrightly addresses these old accusations, but when he is on the campaign trail he is hearing from Virginia families and small businesses concerned about skyrocketing fuel costs, burdensome regulations and increased taxes that are bringing uncertainty.”

The revival of questions about Mr. Allen’s racial attitudes is clearly an effort to help Mr. Kaine break away from Mr. Allen in what has been one of the closest Senate elections in the country. Mr. Kaine, a former chairman of the Democratic National Committee, has been targeted by national conservative groups with millions of dollars of negative television ads.

Will it work?

It could. The intensity of the “macaca” coverage in 2006 made Mr. Allen toxic among donors, dashed his hopes of becoming a serious contender for the 2008 Republican presidential primary, and ultimately cost him his re-election against the Democrat, Jim Webb.

But the stories have faded now. There are plenty of new voters in Virginia who may have little memory of all that coverage. If the labor group can remind them effectively, it could cause Mr. Allen problems again.

But it also could backfire. Despite all of the negative coverage — including, for weeks, reporting about whether Mr. Allen had used a particularly offensive racial epithet often aimed at African-Americans — Mr. Allen came within just a few thousand votes of winning re-election. (He denied using the epithet.)

The avalanche of negativity was seen by political observers as evidence that many Virginia voters were turned off by the series of attacks. Mr. Allen could tap into that sentiment if Mr. Kaine’s allies try a reprise of the 2006 campaign.

Odds are that Mr. Kaine’s advisers are smart enough to avoid getting drawn into the attacks. Better for them if their allies can make the attacks work without any strings attached.

But in the end, it’s also possible that the whole thing could just fizzle this time around.

The economy in 2012 is very different than it was in 2006. People are out of work. Housing values have plummeted. The appetite for personal attacks that date back decades may have faded in the face of those more serious issues.

If so, look for “macaca” to once again become part of YouTube’s early viral history.