After a new website entitled “Craig Ford Exposed” launched Thursday attempting to show that the candidate running as an independent for state Senate District 10 is trying to hide his liberal past, a political mail piece hit households in the Gadsden-area district saying the “lifelong Democrat will do or say anything to get elected.”
Both the website and the mailpiece feature clips from Ford’s infamous “Too Hot for YouTube” videos which were originally posted by the liberal “Left in Alabama” blog after his speech at a Democratic meeting in March 2012.
It was reported then that “Ford quickly realized how damaging they could be and sprung into action,” forcing the blog to take down the candid videos and demanding that Yellowhammer News do the same. Eventually, Ford got YouTube to remove any and all copies of the videos from its site.
The videos, contents of which have now popped back onto a public YouTube channel and can be found below, are extremely controversial and feature Ford criticizing everyone from rural Alabamians and white people to Republicans and Trump voters.
In the video entitled “What Craig Ford says behind closed doors – part 1,” the longtime state legislator has criticism for hundreds of thousands of Alabamians, starting with current-Governor Kay Ivey.
Harshly attacks Kay Ivey
“I’m telling you right now, she is a horrible lieutenant governor, to say the least. And there’s children in here so I’m trying to behave,” Ford said.
Says white, rural Alabamians are racist
He continued to claim that there were 260,000 previously inactive voters in Alabama who turned out in 2010 and swung the balance of the state to the Republican Party.
“Almost 90 percent of those 260,000 people were rural, white Alabamians,” Ford claimed. “So we started polling them, and so you want to be – it’s a disgrace to admit that we’re associated with these people.”
He carried on his criticism of rural, white Alabamians from there, alleging they were racist.
“You should have heard some of the comments they said. They didn’t know if President Obama was a good president or bad president. It was a race issue,” Ford outlined.
Ford then asserted that racism was the only reason “these people” turned out to vote.
“[T]hat’s why they turned out and they turned out and just voted straight Republican – like Goldwater,” Ford said. “History repeats itself.”
“So then we said, ‘OK, we gotta build a database of these 260,000 people because we don’t want these crazies to come back out.’ We want them to go back home for another 20 years,” Ford continued.
He then said that they kept polling this group of voters.
“And what we have determined, over 80 percent of them, now, feel that they have actually gone to the polls and they proved their point. Whether President Obama wins again or he doesn’t win again, they’re not coming back out,” Ford claimed. “So, you know, that’s a good thing.”
“One hundred reasons” why Ford is a Democrat
“Let me tell you one reason I’m a Democrat,” Ford told the crowd. “I could give you 100 reasons – I could speak on that for an hour. But my party, and your party, is the only party that’s the mirror image of the state of Alabama.”
He added, about the Republican Party, “Their party is made up of one species mainly – of white men.”
He followed this by saying Republicans were sexist against white women from the halls of the state legislature to Chamber of Commerce meetings.
Ford’s thoughts about black Democrats – implies white people “not smart enough”
“[T]hey’re going to turn out, and they’re going to vote Democrat,” Ford said in the speech.
“They’re smart enough, and they’re educated enough, they’re Democrats. It’s the white people that we gotta get to,” Ford continued.
Thoughts on the free press
“I got tired of the paper printing bad stuff about me, so I said ‘the hell with them, I’m going to buy my own, print what I want,'” Ford shared. “So, I did.”
People who are not Democrats are “uneducated”
From his comment about his newspaper, Ford continued into a story about a local man who was on welfare and whose wife was on disability. The man – Ford calls him “Jack” – has a Tea Party sign in his yard, which led Ford to confront him.
“You think Republicans care about you?” Ford challenged the man. “No. And, I said not only that … ‘Tea Parties’ are for females.’ Get that sign out of your yard.”
After speaking with him for about an hour, Ford said he convinced Jack on some things, but they still had disagreements.
“I just thought this guy’s crazy. But this is what we have to do,” Ford told the group of Democrats. “We have to educate the uneducated. It’s difficult to do.”
White Alabamians have a “brown issue” – either want to throw minorities in jail or deport them
Ford continued to say that racism drives party affiliation.
“Let me tell you, it’s a generation[al] thing. You know, people don’t think race is an issue in Alabama. It used to be a black issue, now it’s a brown issue,” Ford emphasized.
He continued, “Now, the illegal immigration bill, they want to run all the Hispanics out of the state of Alabama. So if you don’t look like them and act like them and play like them, they’re going to either convict you in a federal court – send you to prison – or either they want you to get out of our state.”
Part 1 concludes with the crowd clapping after Ford rallies the Democrats on this issue.
Part 2 begins with Ford going back to claims of racism.
Republicans winning in 2010 “all had to do” with race
Ford, after mentioning some former colleagues in the state house who lost in 2010, said, “It all had to do with one issue: it was race.”
“I’m telling you right now, that was a difficult thing in the year 2010,” he shared.
Ford’s initial defense of Obamacare, as well as CNN
Ford then told the story of an unnamed man he ran into at Walmart, who did not support Obama or his policies. While seemingly making fun of the man, Ford offered his support of Obamacare.
The man’s argument was that his doctor said Obamacare was bad, which Ford scoffed at.
“You know your doctor drives a Porsche,” Ford told the man. “I said, ‘I haven’t seen him turn his Porsche in yet.’ And I said, ‘so far it’s doing pretty good.'”
Later in the conversation about Obamacare, the man told Ford that “Fox News said it was bad,” to which Ford quipped, “Well, I’ll be, Johnny. CNN said it was great! I’m conflicted, I don’t know which one to believe.”
Now he’s running as an independent
In what will be hard to explain in Ford’s current campaign, he continued to talk proudly about his party affiliation.
The same man in Walmart, after Ford’s CNN barb, told him “You ain’t nothing but a dang Democrat.”
“You got that right,” Ford answered.
Much more on Obamacare
Ford later in his speech offered an aggressive defense of Obamacare, the clip of which is featured on the “Craig Ford Exposed” website.
“We started racking our brains, I said ‘you know what, we’re going to spin that to where it’s a positive thing.’ Obamacare, one day, we’re going to be carrying a card in our wallet – it’s going to be an Obamacare card,” Ford told the crowd.
He added, “How many of y’all have a ‘Bushcare’ card? How many in this room have a ‘Reagancare’ card? … You know why? ‘Cause they don’t care.”
To Democratic applause, Ford added, “And that’s the difference – that’s the difference in our Democratic Party because we try to make things happen and we do care about people and care about those who are less fortunate enough.”
While it is obvious how the website can make use of the controversial videos, the mail piece is something unique in political advertising. When opened, like a birthday card, audio of Ford speaking begins and play for about 30 seconds from multiple clips. Some are additional material from the “Too Hot for YouTube” pair.
“I’m going to be running for State Senate District 10 – thought about it and I’ve been a Democrat all my life – and I’m going to run as an Independent, nothing against the Democratic Party, it’s coming becoming more and more popular to be an Independent,” Ford’s voice says in one very recent example.
In another, he attacks the Republican Party again.
“The Republican Caucus – they all are the same color, they all mainly are males and they all support Donald Trump. That oughta tell you something,” Ford says.
In a striking contrast to Ford’s own words found throughout the videos, the website clips and the mail-piece audio segments, Ford appeared on Friday’s episode of Capitol Journal on Alabama Public Television, telling host Don Dailey that he wants to bridge the gap between the two major parties.
“I think what’s dividing our country is partisan politics; what’s dividing us in Montgomery is partisan politics,” Ford opined.
He added, “We gotta put partisan politics aside … I think we need to run on the issues and, for me, run on my record.”
The website and the mail-piece were paid for by Friends of Andrew Jones, the successful small businessman and Republican running against Ford. Ford has been a member of the State House for over 17 years after he replaced his father, who held the same seat for 26 years, in January 2001.
Thus far, campaign finance reports show that Ford is raising more money in the race, due to his support from special interest groups in Montgomery. He is also supported by traditionally Democratic entities, including the Alabama Education Association (AEA) and various labor unions.
Sean Ross is a staff writer for Yellowhammer News. You can follow him on Twitter @sean_yhn
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