Grimes immigration ad questioned; Obama vote flap, McConnell ad and his lines on Kynect draw fire

A rolling roundup while waiting for Hillary . . .

• Former secretary of state and first lady Hillary Clinton will appear for Alison Lundergan Grimes tonight in Louisville. Philip M. Bailey of Louisville's WFPL reports that every county has a sign (right). The campaign says it will videostream the event at http://salsa3.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=KDu8gjJi%2FhY5spoZeXWyv9USJipC9b3f. Sen. Mitch McConnell's campaign spokeswoman, Allison Moore, said in an email, "The only possible reason why Alison Grimes would throw a party for Hillary Clinton but refuse to admit she voted for Barack Obama is that she thinks we're all too stupid to figure out they have the exact same policy views. Instead of highly produced events with celebrity guests, most Kentuckians would settle for an honest answer from Alison Grimes on anything related to the job of a U.S. senator."
• Pro-immigration groups are calling on Grimes to pull her newest television and radio commercial, in which she says "I've never supported amnesty or benefits for illegal immigrants and I never will" and a narrator uses the term "illegal aliens." Sam Youngman reports for the Lexington Herald-Leader, "After speaking at a Commerce Lexington policy breakfast Wednesday morning, Grimes refused to acknowledge or answer repeated questions about whether her campaign will pull the ad."
• The ad says, "Only Mitch McConnell has voted to give amnesty and taxpayer-funded benefits to 3 million illegal aliens," as small type notes that was in 1985 and 1986. "Mitch is at the heart of everything that's wrong in Washington, from hypocrisy to greed to gridlock." Viewers may infer that Grimes opposes such measures, but she repeated at the breakfast that she favors a Senate-passed bill that would create "a pathway to citizenship" for undocumented immigrants if "You've got a good job, you have a background check, you learn English, you pay your taxes."
  
• An ad McConnell started this week, featuring undercover video of Grimes supporters saying or suggesting that she doesn't really mean what she says about coal, doesn't prove the charge, Robert Farley writes for FactCheck.org. The ad claims the videos of "Grimes' own staff and donors show Grimes is lying," but there is no proof that the "staff" members are or were.
• McConnell has a new ad, about his sponsorship of a law that increased funding to expedite DNA testing, with emphasis on its use in sexual-assault cases.
• Chuck Todd, host of NBC's "Meet the Press," is sticking by his remark that Grimes "disqualified herself" by refusing to say if she voted for President Obama, which McConnell is using in a TV ad. Todd told The Huffington Post, "Campaigns that try to make others the issue are usually trying to avoid their own scrutiny. . . . No journalist likes to be used in a TV ad. It is cheap and likely useless."
• Some observers said Grimes' continued refusal to reveal her vote wasn't as important as McConnell's characterization of Obamacare's Kentucky element as "a website." Danny Vinik writes for The New Republic, a liberal magazine, "You’d expect such a ridiculous argument to be the highlight of the debate with the media quickly and easily debunking it."
• Ron Fournier of the nonpartisan, middle-of-the road National Journal writes, "What's more disqualifying? A Democrat who refuses to say whether she voted for President Obama, or a Republican who waffles on Obamacare and essentially calls it 'fine'? . . . He can't have it both ways. Uprooting Obamacare upends Kynect. . . . He's playing with the health of 500,000 Kentuckians. He's misleading conservatives who don't think Obamacare is 'fine.' He's a hypocrite."