Ron Paul - Fake Huntsman Commercial
Summary
On January 4, 2011 an independent youtube user uploaded a one minute video intended to be taken as a potential campaign ad for Congressman Ron Paul's 2012 Presidential bid. The ad attacked Governor Huntsman's values by showing him speaking Mandarin and showing pictures of him holding his adopted Chinese daughter and his adopted daughter from India. Behind these images, a slow rythm of chinese music plays. The video then asks whose values Governor Huntsman shares, America's or that of other nations.
The major news networks reported the video as being put out by "Ron Paul supporters," and questioned Congressman Paul about the video. Congressman Paul stated that he had no knowledge of it and disavowed it.
A simple examination of both the youtube and twitter accounts of the person that uploaded the video shows that those accounts were created the same day that the video in question was uploaded - January 4, 2012. They have uploaded no other video since, making their only activity on the account to upload the video in question. The associated twitter account sent out a few tweets immediately after the video was uploaded to the Huntsman campaign and some Ron Paul supporters. There was no activity on the twitter account a day after the video was announced on that platform.
Congressman Paul's campaign hired an independent firm to discover what they could about the origins of the video. That company found that the first referal to the video was from jon2012.com - Governor Huntsman's campaign website. Since that website does not allow comments to contain links and the video was obviously not linked from jon2012, the firm concludes that the first referel was from a web mail service on the jon2012 server. This means that the Huntsman campaign was made aware of the video immediately after it was uploaded. The firm concluded that someone within or closely associated to the Huntsman campaign uploaded the video and then made the Huntsman staff aware of it.
This conclusion is supported by the reaction of the Huntsman campaign. The morning of January 5th, the day after the video was first posted and before it was popular, Governor Huntsman appeared on CNN at 8:05 am and stated that he had recieced a tweet from the Paul campaign and would be responding soon. That tweet he was referring to was the one that made them aware of the video. The Huntsman family then appeared on multiple news outlets. The video gave them a chance to tell the stories of the Huntsman family's two adopted daughters and condemn the Paul campaign that was still struggling from previous newsletter issues related to race.
Not long after the video became public, Cindy McCain, wife of Senator John McCain tweeted that the video was disgusting and that Ron Paul should apologize. She compared the incident to the 2000 campaign when the Bush campaign left flyers on cars in South Carolina which hinted that Senator McCain had an illegitimate child while showing him with his adopted Asian daughter.
Video
Youtube Account
The account of the person that originally uploaded the video shows that it was created the same day that the video was uploaded and that no further activity has occured. It also shows that the user claimed to be 38 years old.
Twitter Account
The same day that the video was uploaded to youtube, a twitter account was created in the same name. There were a few tweets to get the video out and then the account went silent.
Response from Huntsman
When asked about the ad, Governor Huntsman stated that he was upset that his adopted daughters were brought into the discussion.
The second oldest of Huntsman's seven children, Abby Huntsman Livingston, denounced the ad on Fox News Channel's "America Live" broadcast.
McCain Response
Cindy McCain, the wife of 2008 Republican presidential nominee John McCain responded in a tweet that the incident reminded her of the 2000 Presidential campaign when the Bush campaign placed flyers on windshields of cars showing McCain's adopted daughter and hinting that McCain had an illegitimate Asian child.
Consulting Firm Analysis
The Ron Paul campaign hired a consulting firm to investigate the origin of the video. That consulting firm found that the first set of views of the video on facebook came from Governor Huntsman's website jon2012.com. The further noted that jon2012.com does not allow links in the comments and the link to the video was not found anywhere on the jon2012 site. The only remaining option was that the first visits from jon2012 came from a webmail type system located on the jon2012.com server.
The youtube account and the twitter account were both created on January 4. Governor Huntsman appeared on CNN at 8:05am and stated "Tell Dr. Paul that I owe him a tweet in return and he should be expecting one sometime soon." This was a reference to a tweet telling Governor Huntsman about the video.
The conclusion of the firm was that someone close to or in the Huntsman campaign created the video and then let the Huntsman campaign know about before anyone else.
To whom it may concern,
The Ron Paul 2012 PCC hired our firm, CanDo.com, to investigate the source of a video titled "Jon Huntsman's Values." The video can be found online at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZeVqj-t1U0
After researching the available evidence, we believe it is likely that the video came from a source within or closely tied to the Huntsman Campaign. We base this assessment on several factors which we present below.
The image below shows "significant discovery events" as recorded by YouTube:
Of significant interest, YouTube shows that the first 12 visits to this video are from Twitter.com, mobile devices, and a link from "Jon2012.com" We thoroughly searched the Jon2012.com site using Google for any reference to this link. None existed. Furthermore, we noted that the comment function of the Jon2012.com site does not allow for hyperlinks, which would be required for YouTube to record the referring domain as Jon2012.com. Since no direct link to the video exists on Jon2012.com, how could YouTube show Jon2012.com as the referring site? Our best guess is that someone used a server on the Jon2012.com domain (such as webmail) to read an email that contained the link to the video. It is also likely that the first mobile views at that same time originated from links in emails. Clicking on a link from a webmail system on Jon2012.com would provide the needed headers for YouTube to record the link.
Furthermore, investigating the account NHLiberty4Paul on YouTube and Twitter, we found that both were created the same day that the video was released. There is no reference to this handle in any public site, prior to the creation of this account, that we could find. Here is our proposed explanation of the events that happened surrounding the release and
discovery of this video:Someone created or was given this video and needed a way to get it out.
They created NHLiberty4Paul on Twitter, and on YouTube
They uploaded this video on Youtube and sent out an email containing the link to this
video on Youtube and the twitter post.
Five mobile devices clicked on the link from the twitter link and from the email link generating the first 10 hits.
One person using a webmail client at Jon2012.com clicked on the YouTube link generating the first referral from Jon2012.com.
According to YouTube's stats for the video, before any real viewer activity, the video was nearly simultaneously referred from Twitter (presumably the tweet from NHLiberty4Paul), viewed on a mobile device, referred from a YouTube search, and referred from Jon2012.com. The very next day, January 5th, at 8:05am, Jon Huntsman appeared on CNN with Solidad O'Brien and states "Tell Dr. Paul that I owe him a tweet in return and he should be expecting one sometime soon."
There could certainly be other explanations, however, based on the evidence above and the coincidental timing of the release and subsequent events, it seems likely that a party close to the Huntsman campaign posted and distributed this video impersonating a Ron Paul supporter in order to cast Ron Paul and his campaign in a negative light.
Please let us know if you have any further questions with regard to this matter.
Sincerely,Rob Ratterman
CanDo.co
