The conservative-leaning nonprofit group YG (Young Guns) Network has announced a six-figure digital ad buy encouraging five U.S. Reps to support the Sequestration Transparency Act.
The bill would require full disclosure from the Office of Management and Budget on across-the-board cuts scheduled for January 2, 2013.
Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), one of the bill’s sponsors, said the bill would require the President to report to Congress on basic details of the sequester and provide transparency.
In opening remarks last month before a markup session on the bill, Ryan said that, under the Budget Control Act, the OMB would make arbitrary spending cuts resulting in 10 percent cuts to defense and 8 percent to non-defense discretionary spending.
But the ad, which will air in the PA-12 media market to target Rep. Mark Critz (D-Cambria) – although it does not mention him by name – is decidedly focused on the potential effects to the military, not the discretionary spending cuts.
The narrator begins by saying that the sequester would mean “automatic, across-the-board cuts to our national defense imposed under the Budget Control Act.”
The ad continues: “What will be cut? We don’t know. Only President Obama and his most senior officials know, but they’ve refused to provide details.”
The narrator also says that even “Obama’s own Secretary of Defense” feared the “devastating effects” of such cuts, and that people have a right to know what’s being cut from national defense.
YG Network Senior Adviser Brad Dayspring said the sequester was designed to encourage compromise on both sides of the aisle to make the best decisions for taxpayers, but that the President never gave an alternative to the plan.
“If President Obama doesn’t have an alternative plan to the sequester, it is critical that he specifically outline the impact that it will have on our national security and how jobs will be affected in communities around the country with a strong military presence,” he said.
In a nutshell, the group is sewing the seeds for a new line of attack for Critz’s challenger, Keith Rothfus, but because the two can’t coordinate, the ad leaves Critz’s name out.
For his part, Critz has said he opposes the cuts, and has called on lawmakers from both sides to strike a deal to prevent them.
As reported by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, a new study predicts that PA will lose 78,000 jobs if the budget sequestration goes into effect, with half of those losses in the defense industry. Defense and security companies like Lockheed Martin – which has an office located in PA-12 – would also take a hit.