An executive producer at New Hampshire Public Radio said Monday he made a mistake by editing the word “tax” out of a key answer given by Democrat Maggie Hassan during a September debate in a recent partial rebroadcast.

In a debate on Sept. 19, the two major candidates for governor were asked whether they support the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), in which states auction carbon dioxide emission allowances in auctions and must invest the proceeds in energy efficiency, renewable energy, and other clean energy technologies.

Republican Ovide Lamontagne said he did not and said “we should repeal” the law that prompted New Hampshire’s participation.

Hassan supported RGGI, saying, “I was proud to be a sponsor of that tax — eh — the energy efficiency program because it has saved businesses millions and millions of dollars and created over 400 jobs.”

The New Hampshire Journal, a Republican web site, reported last Friday that shortly after the debate, the New Hampshire chapter of the conservative advocacy group,

Americans for Prosperity, began airing a radio ad criticizing Hassan for being proud to sponsor “that tax.”

AFP did not include her apparent correction, “eh, the energy efficiency program” in the ad.

New Hampshire Journal reported that in a rebroadcast of the debate last week, the word “tax” was edited out, leaving her appearing to say:
“I was proud to be a sponsor of the energy efficiency program because…..”

NHPR executive producer Keith Shields told both the New Hampshire Journal and the New Hampshire Union Leader the cut of the word “tax” from Hassan’s answer was a mistake and not related to the politics.

The archived recording of the debate still contains the full Hassan phrase, including the word “tax.”

Shields told the Union Leader the archived version was never changed and has always included the word “tax.”

Shields explained that during a fund-raising drive last Wednesday, NHPR broadcast a 30-minute special on “The Exchange” program.

During the special, Shields said, “We decided we would display little excerpts of each debate and sandwich it in between some conversation.

“What we were really just doing was just chopping it down and taking ‘ums’ and ‘ehs’ and stutters out of it,” Shield explained. He said he made the edit himself.

“This was completely not intentional,” he said. “This was sort of something done with a quick deadline and sort of not really realizing that the little stutter was in any way, shape or form being used politically. If we had realized that, then we would have totally kept it in.”

Shields said he recognizes the word “tax” has political implications, but, “When you’re sort of listening to it as a audio editor, all you’re really listening for are stutters. You hear that and you say, ‘Oh, it’s just a quick stutter,’ not sort of any editorial context.”

Shields said, “Looking back, it was ‘Oh, geez.’ I totally see where it’s coming from there, but it was not in any way forcing our politics on anything.”

Shields said he did not realize the removal of word “tax” was caused controversy until Friday, the same day the New Hampshire Journal posted its report.

On Monday, the national conservative web site, the American Thinker, posted a story on the incident under the headline “New Hampshire Public Radio Edits Debate Tape to Favor the Democrat.”

Shields said NHPR plans to replay the full, unedited debate this week, probably Friday.
Meanwhile, Hassan campaign spokesman Marc Goldberg said she “certainly does not believe that (RGGI) is a tax,” but he would not characterize it as a mistake or misstatement.

“She feels it is an energy efficiency program, which she was proud to support, that created hundreds of jobs and lowered energy costs by millions of dollars,” he said.

“I don’t think the Republicans in the Legislature who voted for the energy efficiency program or Republican (former New York) Governor George Pataki, who started the initiative, consider it a tax either,” Goldberg said.

“This is an attempt by Ovide’s campaign or Ovide himself to distract voters from his radical ideas, by rejecting federal funds for public schools, by opposing guaranteed statewide kindergarten, by opting the state out of Medicare and restricting a woman’s right to make her own health care decisions. These radical idea will hurt New Hampshire’s families and New Hampshire’s economy.”

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