Brown criticizes Bill Clinton at campaign stop after rival uses Clinton footage in TV ad

more images

more images

Jerry Brown mocks Bill Clinton over campaign clip

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Gubernatorial candidate Jerry Brown took a swipe at fellow Democrat and former President Bill Clinton after an 18-year-old video clip of Clinton appeared in a TV attack ad for Brown’s current rival.

In new video from a Sunday event posted on Time Magazine’s website, Brown said Republican Meg Whitman has “even got Clinton lying about me.”

“I mean Clinton’s a nice guy, but who ever said he always told the truth?” Brown said in the footage. “You remember, right? There’s that whole story there about did he or didn’t he.”

The comment appeared to be a jab about Clinton and former White House intern Monica Lewinsky, with whom Clinton had a relationship.

Clinton became the unwitting star of the Whitman ad that uses footage from a 1992 Democratic presidential primary debate in which Clinton criticized the record of Brown, then a presidential hopeful.

In the ad, Clinton called Brown’s assertion about his record on taxes “just plain wrong” and said Brown took credit for voters approving Proposition 13, the 1978 ballot initiative that rolled back and capped property taxes.

Brown opposed the measure but embraced it after the election.

“And now he’s going around taking credit for it,” Clinton said in the video. “He raised taxes as governor of California. He had a surplus when he took office and a deficit when he left. He doesn’t tell the people the truth.”

As governor from 1975 to 1983, Brown built the state’s surplus to $6 billion, but he and the Legislature spent much of it — about $4.2 billion — bailing out local governments and schools after Proposition 13 passed. Their goal was to offset the immediate effects of the lowered property tax revenue.

At the time, the move was praised by tax-cut crusader Howard Jarvis and supported by Republicans in the Legislature.

“The bottom line is Meg Whitman has an ad that has been determined to be false,” Brown campaign spokesman Sterling Clifford said “She should take it down.”

A Clinton spokesman did not immediately respond to a phone message or e-mail from The Associated Press.

Clinton and Brown have had a testy relationship since that presidential race. Clinton endorsed Brown’s primary campaign rival San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom before he dropped out last year.

Time did not identify who shot the video.