Democratic Massachusetts Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren's campaign released two new ads Monday rebutting Sen. Scott Brown's (R-Mass.) charge that she shortchanged asbestos victims while representing Travelers Insurance.
The ads feature people affected by mesothelioma -- a rare cancer usually caused by asbestos exposure -- telling Brown to back off. "Elizabeth Warren went all the way to the Supreme Court to try to get more money for asbestos victims and families," says Ginny Jackson, whose husband died of the disease after being exposed to asbestos while working at a shipyard. "Now Scott Brown is attacking Elizabeth Warren about her work. Scott Brown is not telling the truth. He’s trying to use our suffering to help himself. He outta be ashamed."
Brown attacked Warren over the case in a recent debate. "You chose to side with one of the biggest corporations in the United States: Travelers Insurance," Brown said on Sept. 20. "When you worked to prohibit people who got asbestos poisoning, and I hope all the asbestos union workers are watching right now. She denied, she helped Travelers deny those benefits for asbestos poisoning, made over $250,000 in an effort to protect big corporations. There is only one person in this debate, right now Jon, who is protecting corporations. She has a history of it."
The Boston Globe did an exhaustive investigation into Warren's work with Travelers Insurance, which lasted from 2008 to 2010 and for which she was compensated $212,000. Warren, a professor at Harvard Law School, was working for Travelers to establish a $500 million trust for victims in exchange for immunity from other lawsuits. Warren, a bankruptcy law expert, was trying to preserve an element of bankruptcy code to help victims of corporate wrongdoing get compensation. She was mostly successful, but after she left the case, another court let Travelers out of its payment obligations to victims.
Here is the ad, titled "Ashamed":
Here is the ad, titled "Devastating":
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