John Gard's first campaign ad, as he tries to unseat Congressman Steve Kagen , has drawn attention from a cable news pundit, and Gard's not backing down.
Gard's been slammed over the ad, by MSNBC'S Keith Olberman , who notes that earlier this summer Gard retracted a statement which claimed other countries were already drilling for oil off of the Cuban coast. Gard's TV ad now claims foreign countries are poised to drill for oil off of Cuba's coast — and he's not backing off that claim. "Our ad is factually accurate, I stand by it," says Gard , who's making his second bid at the Eighth Congressional District seat. "There is a lot of oil in the outer continental shelf. Cuba knows it, China knows it, Venezuela knows it, and the United States knows it." That oil, says Gard, could drive down the price of gas at the pump, but only of the U.S. goes to get it. "I don't know why we would allow China or Cuba or any of these other countries . . . to prepare exploration or drilling in our outer continental shelf, and have the Americans sit idly by."