Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill is calling on Missouri Attorney General Josh Hawley, the man with whom she is currently locked in a tight race, to investigate a politically damaging undercover video showing McCaskill staffers saying that she masks her more radical political agenda and that Planned Parenthood hides its donations to her campaign.
“McCaskill’s campaign said it will pursue legal action in connection with this incident,” KMBC News reports. “The campaign is also asking for Attorney General Josh Hawley — McCaskill’s Republican opponent — to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate violations of the state’s Merchandising Act.”
In one particularly problematic moment in the video, McCaskill’s staffers at a campaign site in Columbia, Missouri, says that Planned Parenthood uses “other means” to support and give money to the senator’s campaign in order to hide their support from the red-state voters.
“So what were you telling me last night about Planned Parenthood?” asked the undercover reporter.
“How they never — they don’t donate to Claire because they don’t want to ostracize pro-life Democrats in Missouri,” the staffer replied. Another staffer provides further explanation: “They go through other means to support and give money. They just don’t directly give money from their PACs.”
“McCaskill’s campaign manager said Planned Parenthood has given McCaskill at least $5,000 during the campaign, and that it was reported — not hidden,” KMBC reports.
As The Daily Wire reported Monday, the video also shows McCaskill and her staff “admitting that she supports banning semi-automatic weapons, bump stocks, high-capacity magazines, along with supporting other far-left policies.” One staffer explains that the Democrat senator cannot be honest about her more radical policies because “she has a bunch of Republican voters” and being transparent “could hurt her ability to get elected.”
McCaskill has responded to the video by slamming Hawley for “embrac[ing] fraudulently embedding somebody in my campaign.”
“It is startling that Josh Hawley would embrace fraudulently embedding somebody in my campaign,” she said. “He is the Attorney General of Missouri. He’s supposed to be going after fraud, not applauding it. I have been very upfront about all my positions.”
Real Clear Politics’ average of the most recent key polls finds McCaskill and Hawley deadlocked for the crucial Missouri Senate seat.
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Related: ‘People Just Can’t Know That’: McCaskill, Staff Exposed In Undercover Sting Video