Barnett: It wasn’t me

Chris Barnett has confirmed neither he nor anyone associated with his campaign or senatorial office had anything to do with a personal attack ad against his fellow Democrat Dwayne San Nicolas.

The ad, the type of which often is called a “black ad” due to its personal and authorless nature, has been condemned by its intended target (San Nicolas) and by Democratic Party of Guam chairman Tony Babauta. Mr. Barnett is featured in the ad as its protagonist.

“Not involved,” Mr. Barnett said of the ad. “We didn’t put that together.”

His lone caveat was that, “obviously, someone agrees with my floor remarks;” remarks that were critical of the eight senators who voted to pass a budget bill that shortchanges the Guam Department of Education and the Guam Cancer Trust. The black ad, however, uses Mr. Barnett’s floor remarks cut against two repeated out-of-context phrases from Mr. San Nicolas’ floor remarks to make it appear as though Mr. Barnett was singling out his colleague and to erroneously portray Mr. San Nicolas as celebrating the underfunding of critical government programs.

“I stand by what I said of the floor, and I don’t need any attack ads to validate what I said, or the arguments that I made,” Mr. Barnett said. “Not from us,” he repeated his denial of involvement in the illegal ad. “Not from my campaign. Not involved. Not at all.”

The black ad starts with bold words on a black screen, “These senators voted to cut funding to your children (sic) education by $47 million dollars. (sic) In the FY2025 budget.”

The statement refers to the legislature’s August 30 decision to pass the government of Guam’s Fiscal Year 2025 budget that includes appropriations to the Guam Department of Education that are $47 million less than what GDOE requested. The criticism also mirrors lamentations education committee chairman Barnett made during remarks following the passage of the bill. A razor-thin majority of eight senators including San Nicolas, Amanda Shelton, Will Parkinson, Roy Quinata, Tina Muna Barnes, Tom Fisher, Jesse Lujan, and Joe San Agustin sent the spending bill to Lou Leon Guerrero for her consideration. The new fiscal year begins on October 1, 2024.

The words on the black screen of the ad then change to say, “They also cut funding for our family members suffering from cancer by 2 million dollars.”

That also mirrors Mr. Barnett’s floor criticism of the bill and Ms. Taitague’s complaint during that portion of the budget session. The issue involves the legislature’s decision to appropriate to the Guam Cancer Trust $1 million instead of the $3 million senators typically appropriate to the trust.

Senators passed a $1.3 billion spending bill, about $100 million more than the current fiscal year’s authorizations on top of an estimated $27 million in surplus revenue GovGuam is anticipated to rake in by September 30.

The black ad then features filtered footage of the floor remarks by senators, targeting Mr. San Nicolas and repeatedly showing him stating, “It’s a wonderful day for us all,” then cutting to a portion of his remarks where he says, “just amazing.” The context of Mr. San Nicolas’ remarks concerned his elation that senators accepted his rider to the budget directing the authorization of a lease between the Chamorro Land Trust Commission and the Guam Motorsports Association to resurrect the closed-down race track in Yigo.

It features Mr. Barnett in his floor remarks saying, “We voted on a budget bill today. Contrary to what many believe, this is not a bill on the racetrack. This was a bill that gave the Guam Department of Education $47 million less than what they asked for.”

“Just amazing,” the ad cuts to Mr. San Nicolas saying, which is an out-of-context match up of floor remarks.

“However,” Mr. Barnett continues in the ad, “with this budget process, that opportunity, which is absolutely germane to the budget process was taken from us because a majority of colleagues felt it wasn’t important to give the Department of Education the money they need to fix the schools…”

“Just amazing,” the ad has Mr. San Nicolas repeating, again out of context.

“…to give the Department of Education the money they need to hire security guards,” Mr. Barnett continues in the ad, “so that Finegayan and Wettengel don’t get broken into every other night. We also killed the opportunity to fund the Guam Police Department to pay for police presence at our schools. Yet, we’re in here clapping. As very critical areas of our government, yes, the racetrack will open. But Guam Memorial Hospital, the Guam Department of Education, the Guam Police Department, we shorted the cancer patients $2 million!”

“It’s a wonderful day for us all,” the ad cuts away to repeat Mr. San Nicolas’ line referring to the passage of his racetrack rider.

“But we want to celebrate today,” Mr. Barnett mocks the behavior of the majority who had passed the bill.

The ad then ends with a black screen featuring the names of seven of the eight senators who voted to pass the budget bill, then a montage of the pictures of those seven senators. The senator missing from both the list and the montage is Ms. Shelton. She is the only one of the eight not facing senatorial reelection.