Bill Burton, the head of the super PAC backing President Obama’s reelection campaign, responded Thursday to calls from the right and some women’s groups that the PAC should repudiate some of the past language from comedian Bill Maher, who donated $1 million to the PAC last month.
“First of all, obviously, some of those things were vulgar and inappropriate and said over the course of years of a comedian’s life,” Burton told MSNBC. “It’s not language I would use or language we would use at Priorities USA.”
Burton then went on to dismiss the suggestion that Maher’s past words about Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann were comparable to Rush Limbaugh’s attacks on Sandra Fluke.
“What the de facto leader of the Republican Party said to sexually degrade a woman who led in a political debate of our time is crazy,” Burton said. “There’s no similarity about what Rush Limbaugh said, lying about the argument that Miss Fluke was making, a law student at Georgetown, and what a comedian has said in the past.”
Republicans have been pushing Obama and the super PAC supporting him to rebuke Maher as they face continued criticism over Limbaugh, who the GOP has tried to distance itself from somewhat as pressure continues to build on the conservative talker after he spent three days attacking Fluke (and turning the unknown law student into a household name.)
Watch Burton on MSNBC:
