美国国家公共电台 NPR Local Candidates Are The Subject Of Political Tracking, Too

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NOEL KING, HOST:

It's hard to imagine politics these days without candidates playing gotcha with the other side. One method is called political tracking. That's the practice of following candidates around and then just constantly filming what they say in public. Now, this has been pretty common in big races, but now candidates for local office are finding themselves being tracked. North Country Public Radio's Lauren Rosenthal has the story.

LAUREN ROSENTHAL, BYLINE¹: A video surfaced this summer of Democratic congressional candidate Tedra Cobba meeting with teenagers in upstate New York. There isn't much to look at. The tape is shaky and out of focus.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING²)

TEDRA COBB: When I was at this...

ROSENTHAL: But listen closely, and you can hear Cobb saying something controversial, that she supports a ban on assault weapons. But she's following campaign advice to keep that private.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

COBB: Do not say...

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: That was a...

COBB: ...That you want an assault rifle ban...

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: No.

COBB: ...Because you will not win.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: Before we a...

ROSENTHAL: The tape went viral. It turns out the person who made this recording is a 17-year-old who was hired by national Republican officials. He's now an intern³ for Cobb's opponent in this race, Republican Congresswoman Elise Stefanik. Stefanik says tracking is common on both sides. Democrats⁴ and Republicans do it.

ELISE STEFANIK: Going back to my first campaign, I've been tracked for years. I get tracked in Congress. I get tracked outside my home. I get tracked in public events and private fundraisers.

ROSENTHAL: Stefanik says that's just part of being in Congress. But even in more local politics and races way down the ballot⁵, tracking is starting to become a fixture⁶. In the last few years, video or audio recordings⁷ have shaken up at least a half dozen state House and gubernatorial races, a race for mayor in Atlanta and even a petition drive in the city of Palm Bay, Fla., where the deputy mayor worked with his mother to track people circulating petitions. USC political scientist Christian⁸ Grose says this practice of tracking political players on tape has spread pretty far from its roots.

CHRISTIAN GROSE: One of the very first ones I can remember that was a major tracking event was the Virginia Senate race in the 2000s when George Allen was speaking in a really rural area.

ROSENTHAL: Allen used the word macaca, a racial slur⁹, to refer to the tracker who was filming him that day. Allen lost his election by a tiny margin¹⁰. That was 2006. A few years later, Mitt¹¹ Romney was caught on tape at a fundraiser criticizing people who don't pay taxes. The tape derailed his campaign. Researcher Robin¹² Kolodny says, over time, smartphones have made it much easier to record candidates and share information fast. Kolodny says there's always a risk of being tracked, no matter what you're running for.

ROBIN KOLODNY: You just ought to assume that everything - that, like, there's the camera in your house, you know? - that everything is being surveilled, just waiting for, you know, the statement that's going to ruffle¹³ some people.

ROSENTHAL: Shocking voters is a tried-and-true political strategy, says Tammy Vigil, a communications professor at Boston University.

TAMMY VIGIL: For a long stretch, there was a lot of research that actually showed that negative campaign ads could be influential¹⁴. And I think we've sort of taken that to the extreme.

ROSENTHAL: Vigil says researchers are starting to examine what happens when negativity and strategies like tracking trickle¹⁵ down to local politics, too. Some candidates have chosen to cut back on public events where they're at risk of being filmed. Tedra Cobb, the candidate who was secretly recorded talking about gun control in upstate New York, says she doesn't want to hide from voters.

COBB: I'm going to engage kids and adults to have these hard conversations. And that's what we were doing.

ROSENTHAL: But there is a price to that. Cobb's opponent recently put out a political ad with the comments about gun control front and center.

(SOUNDBITE OF POLITICAL AD, "CLEAR CHOICE")

UNIDENTIFIED VOICE ACTOR: She confessed that admitting that in public would destroy her campaign. If we can't trust Tedra Cobb the candidate, how can we ever trust her in Congress?

ROSENTHAL: That's a question voters may find themselves asking about candidates closer and closer to home.

For NPR News, I'm Lauren Rosenthal in upstate New York.