By Scott Conroy - September 10, 2014
Real Clear Politics



Louisiana Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu is running a new TV ad that accuses her Republican opponent, U.S. Rep. Bill Cassidy, of being soft on border security for opposing a fence on the Mexican border.

The problem? Landrieu herself called the fence “dumb” in a speech on the Senate floor last year, when she expressed regret for her earlier vote in support of it.

In the three-term senator’s new 30-second spot, a narrator notes that Cassidy has been criticizing Landrieu on the illegal immigration issue, even though he has opposed building a border fence.

The ad then cuts to video footage of a 2010 town-hall meeting, in which Cassidy says, “Our threat is not the folks coming across the border.”

The ad then notes that Landrieu “voted to double the border patrol, build triple-layer fencing, and voted nine times to block amnesty.”

But in her 2013 speech on the Senate floor, Landrieu struck an entirely different note on triple-layer fencing.

“I voted for the dumb fence once,” she said at the time. “I’m not going to do it again because I learned my mistake when I went down there to look at it and realized that we could build two dumb fences or three dumb fences, and it’s not working. So I am simply not going to waste the money to do something that I know will not work.”

Landrieu’s attempt to turn the immigration issue to her advantage is especially notable in light of President Obama’s announcement over the weekend that he would not use executive action to implement immigration reform until after the midterm elections.

Obama’s decision was quietly hailed by Democrats who face tough re-election battles in deep-red states where the immigration issue remains particularly toxic.

“I'm Mary Landrieu, and I approve this message because on border security, I'll put my record up against anyone, especially Bill Cassidy,” Landrieu says directly to the camera at the ad’s conclusion.

The Landrieu campaign has not publicized its new 30-second spot, which aired on New Orleans television Wednesday morning.

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