San Francisco’s Municipal Transportation Agency has a policy against political ads on its buses, but an ad being displayed now comes pretty close. The ad says, “In any war between the civilized man and the savage, support the civilized man. Support Israel. Defeat jihad.”
The pro-Israel ad was purchased by the American Freedom Defense Initiative run by Pamela Geller.
The bus message didn’t sit very well with the city system in New York. They refused to run them and Geller took the transit authority to court. “And interestingly enough, the day that I won, was the day that San Francisco approved my ads that are currently running on your buses,” Geller said.
A coincidence? Not according to Muni’s spokesman Paul Rose. “In this specific case, litigation was brought to this organization and the transit agency lost,” he told ABC7 News. So, the buses with the signs will continue to roll for at least the next four weeks.
Asked how this particular ad is not considered political in light of Muni’s no-politics policy, Rose struggled to answer. However, the legal action and the fact that the New York MTA has already lost in court have had an impact.