DCCC Releases Video Alleging Freedom’s Watch/NRCC Collusion

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) today released a web video outlining what it calls illegal collaboration between the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) and the conservative advocacy group Freedom’s Watch.

Both Freedom’s Watch (see here) and the NRCC (see here) have aired television ads in Louisiana attacking Don Cazayoux, Democratic candidate for the state’s sixth congressional district seat. The DCCC alleges that the organizations collaborated illegally in creating the ads.

The DCCC first alleged illegal coordination between Freedom’s Watch and the NRCC last Wednesday in a complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC). In the press release accompanying that complaint, the DCCC said Freedom’s Watch had “provided television stations running their ads” with a script that “included electronic identifiers indicating that the NRCC created the Word document.”

Freedom’s Watch Vice President of Communications Ed Patru called the DCCC’s allegations “nonsense.” Patru told The Hill that the ad maker Freedom’s Watch hired to write the Cazayoux ad had previously worked with the NRCC; that ad maker, Patru said, “as a matter of practice recycles Word documents when he writes scripts.”

“Last week they wanted to indict us for recycling a Word document, this week they