Monday, March 03, 2008

Team Obama on Naftagate: This Did Not Happen   [Byron York]

In a conference call going on now, the Obama campaign is continuing to flatly deny that adviser Austan Goolsbee told Canadian officials not to worry about Obama's anti-NAFTA stance. "This conversation has been discredited by the Canadian government, it has been discredited by our campaign, it is a conversation that simply did not happen," campaign manager David Plouffe said.

MORE: More details from Plouffe.  He concedes that Goolsbee did talk to someone in the Canadian government, but insists the two were "essentially having some casual conversation, and the reports of the conversation are simply not accurate."  Plouffe says Goolsbee was not speaking as a representative of the Obama campaign and that allegations that "somehow this was an official meeting" are not true.

"This is just a conversation that did not happen in terms of any suggestion of softening of [Sen. Obama's] position," Plouffe said.  "This was not a formal conversation.  It was not a request that came through the campaign…It was not a discussion with the Canadian government about Sen. Obama's position on NAFTA."
 

03/03 01:30 PMShare