Progressive Minnesota Democrats have long joked that CD7 Congressman Collin Peterson is really a Republican.
Now the National Republican Campaign Committee has taken that idea one step farther and set up a fake Collin Peterson for Congress site.
CNN Special investigations Unit's Dan Griffin explorse the strategy in National Republican Congressional Campaign using fake Democrat websites to lure voters:
A warning this election season: If you are searching the Web for information on Democratic congressional candidates, read the fine print.
At least 15 websites that appear to be official campaign sites for Democratic candidates, are actually the handiwork of the National Republican Congressional Committee.
In an effort to improve their online efforts this election season, the NRCC’s digital team came up with what the group believes is a great idea: get out the Republican message through fake Democrat sites.
“The idea is people who are looking for information on the candidate, one of the places we all go now is online and so this is a way for folks to find out more about the candidates and information they may not find on the candidate’s own site,” said Daniel Scarpinato, the NRCC's press secretary.
The NRCC bought up hundreds of URLs on potential weak Democratic candidates and created sites that mimic the real ones.
It may sound deceiving, but Scarpinato insists the well-thought out, well-planned program is pure genius.
”Well, we are very proud of this program.”
And to think just last December, the Republican-leaning American Future Fund was fretting about whether Collin Peterson had lost his Minnesota Nice.
Clearly, the NRCC isn't worrying about being Minnesota Nice in this race.
Here's CNN's video of the report:
Screenshot: Not a Collin Peterson web site. But that DONATE button is huge and the Republicans are proud of this sort of thing.
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