Your support helps us to tell the story
The mother of a gun violence victim sat for an NBC News interview in July and now is slamming a pro-Donald Trump group for distorting her words to attack Kamala Harris in a new ad.
Kimberly Burrell, 53, was one of five Black voters from Philadelphia interviewed by the network this summer about the issues that matter most to them ahead of the election. Now, snippets of the lifelong Democrat appear in a conservative PAC’s ad slamming “Bidenomics.”
The ad focuses on the economy under President Joe Biden. “Imagine the mother making minimum wage trying to feed children,” a choked-up Burrell says in the clip. “They’re killing us without killing us.”
The ad then freezes on Burrell’s tear-stained face as a video of a chipper Kamala Harris speaking plays beside her in a split screen. “That is called Bidenomics,” the vice president says with a laugh.
When her relatives notified her that she was in an anti-Harris ad, Burrell was “distraught,” she told the Philadelphia Inquirer. The 30-second ad reportedly began running on October 2 by the Restoration PAC. The group’s website states that it “provides support to truly conservative candidates, and opposes Leftists and the woke agenda.”
“I was a mess,” the pro-Harris supporter added. “I couldn’t stop crying.”
“They can just steal your image and comments and twist it the way they want it to be twisted,” the paralegal said. “It’s just really sick.”
Most of the original interview focused on gun violence; Burrell’s lost her 18-year-old son, Darryl Pray Jr, in 2009 to gun violence. But at some point the group discussed key issues they were concerned about this election cycle. Burrell explained that she was concerned about inflation.
Inflation is “hitting me hard,” Burrell said, adding that she “blames the federal government” for it — but didn’t name the Biden-Harris administration.
“I’m an educated voter,” the 53-year-old later explained to the outlet. “So I know it takes years to get rid of the policies of the previous administration.”
Earlier in the interview, she also mentioned: “I would like to see everyone who is a ‘criminal’ with federal charges still be able to vote.” The comment was a slight to Trump, who was convicted of 34 counts of falsifying business records, Burrell said: “If we can have a criminal for president, we need to allow some voting rights back that were taken illegally in the first place.”
When the Philadelphia Inquirer reporter contacted Restoration PAC for comment, its spokesperson replied: “Your X feed indicates you are a hard-partisan with a strong case of Trump Derangement Syndrome — therefore you don’t need my help in cobbling together your biased column. Have a blessed day.”
The Independent has reached out to the PAC for comment.
