Canada is making yet another appearance on the 2016 campaign trail — this time as an accidental backdrop for a Marco Rubio campaign ad.
The Rubio campaign released an ad over the weekend called “Morning again,” which starts with the narrator saying, “It’s morning again in America.”
The only problem — the footage being shown is of the harbor in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
Rubio spokesman Alex Conant called the ad a “good catch” by BuzzFeed, which first reported the footage, and said the campaign was “not going to make Canada an issue in this election.”
But in this case, the harbor footage of a tugboat in the early morning hours was taken in Canada. The tugboat is in front of the iconic Vancouver skyline and has a small Canadian flag flying on the back.
Vancouver-based videographer Guy Chavasse told CBC News that he shot the footage before putting it up on stock video sites. Campaign ad-makers regularly license stock footage for spots.
Chavasse told CBC News he shot the footage last August.
“It’s pretty funny, isn’t it?” he said. “It’s a good-looking video, no doubt, but it’s pretty recognizable as Vancouver.”
Incorrect footage has tripped up campaigns before, including this cycle when Donald Trump’s campaign mistakenly used footage of Soviet veterans instead of American veterans in an ad last month.
And Canada has made a few other appearances on the trail, in part because it’s the birthplace of Sen. Ted Cruz. Trump has claimed that the Texas senator isn’t eligible for the presidency because of that, though Cruz was an American citizen at birth because his mother is American.
The ad is designed as an homage to Ronald Reagan’s famous “Morning in America” ad from his 1984 election, using the opening line and recreating the shots with new footage.
