Republican Pennsylvania Senate candidate Dr. Mehmet Oz is the target of two new ads put out by a Democratic super PAC focusing on allegations that he was involved in medical research that killed puppies and dogs.
Senate Majority PAC’s television spots, first reported on by CNN, are part of what the network says is a TV ad campaign for the Pennsylvania race expected to cost at least $33 million.
“It’s a story of unimaginable abuse,” a voiceover says in one ad, according to Politico. “Mehmet Oz ran experiments on puppies, killing over three hundred dogs.” The ad goes on to claim that puppies in the experiments were “struggling to breathe, leaking blood, vomiting, paralysis; their screams horrifying.”
The other ad follows one particular puppy that is said to have been in the lab for 29 days until it was taken by Oz “for the ‘last experiment.’”
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Pennsylvania U.S. Senate candidate Dr. Mehmet Oz speaks during a Republican leadership forum on May 11, 2022, in Newtown, Pennsylvania.
(Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)
One ad first aired Tuesday during the Philadelphia Phillies’ MLB National League Division Series Game 1 against the Atlanta Braves, and the other is set to air during Wednesday’s Game 2.
Jezebel reported on the experiments last week in an examination of 75 studies out of the labs at the Columbia University Institute of Comparative Medicine where Oz was “principal investigator.” The Jezebel report discussed experiments on live animals, 34 of which reportedly resulted in 329 dead dogs. The report also recalled how whistleblower veterinarian Catherine Dell’Orto made several allegations, including a litter of puppies being killed via injection without sedation and then placed in a garbage bag along with other puppies who were still alive.
Senate Majority PAC spokesperson Veronica Yoo said in a statement that “[p]uppy killer Mehmet Oz should be under investigation for animal abuse—not running for U.S. Senate.”
Oz campaign spokesperson Brittany Yanick told CNN that Oz was “not in the operating room when the operations were done … wasn’t present during the post-op treatments, no one alerted him of the problem until after the cases were finished, and he does not condone the mistreatment of animals.”
Oz is currently scheduled to debate Democratic candidate Lt. Gov. John Fetterman on Oct. 25.