Fact checking Corbett ad

The Republican candidate in the Pennsylvania governor’s race leaves out lots of context in its ad.

WHYY is fact-checking some of the ads in the Pennsylvania governor’s race. A new commercial for Republican Tom Corbett does not fudge the facts, but misleads voters by leaving out context.

At the beginning of Corbett’s latest negative spot, a woman tells viewers Allegheny County has lost 21,000 jobs during Democrat Dan Onorato’s tenure as county executive.

While the figure is correct, the spot leaves out the context that Allegheny County’s unemployment rate has stayed below the state and national average.

The latest figures on the federal Department of Labor’s website show an 8.0 percent unemployment rate there, compared to Pennsylvania’s 8.9 percent figure and the national 9.5 percent unemployment rate.

“Who ran on a promise of cutting property taxes ten percent, and broke his promise? Dan Onorato.”

That’s true, too – but property taxes haven’t gone up during Onorato’s two terms, either.

And as the Democrat points out on the campaign trail, he fought against a court-ordered property reassessment which would have likely led to higher taxes.

The narrator also says Onorato supports a “massive energy tax.” She’s referring to a tax on natural gas extraction – not the more controversial cap-and-trade measure.