South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem is facing a lawsuit for publishing a video to social media of her endorsing a dentist in Texas.
Published Monday, the video shows Noem describing how she lost a few teeth during a bicycling accident a few years back and was unhappy with how they were “fixed” until she went to Smile Texas, a dentist in Houston.
“The team here was remarkable and finally gave me a smile that I can be proud of and confident in, and that really is a gift that I think is going to be incredibly special to have,” she says in the video.
“It means a lot to me that something as small as your smile really can change the world. I think that people’s first impressions of you are important, and I want people to know how much I enjoy seeing them and how much I love being with people, and the fact that he gave me the smile to do that now — I’ll be eternally grateful,” she adds.
Watch:
I love my new family at Smile Texas! The video says it all, and I am so grateful for their help fixing my smile for me. pic.twitter.com/z2kTmiY8td
— Kristi Noem (@KristiNoem) March 12, 2024
The video has since drawn the ire of Travelers United, a consumer advocacy group that has accused Noem of doing an “undisclosed advertisement” for Smile Texas.
“There are many dentists and cosmetic dentists in South Dakota,” the group’s lawsuit against her reads. “No one with an extremely important job in South Dakota would fly to Texas to receive dental treatment and then sit in that office and film an advertisement without some form of compensation.”
“Kristi Noem acted here as an influencer. She likely either received free dental care in exchange for this advertisement, discounted dental care in exchange for this advertisement or she was paid and received free dental care for the advertisement. Unfortunately, Noem did not mark this as an ‘Ad’ or ‘Advertisement’ when posting so she is participating in an unfair and deceptive practice,” it continues.
Speaking with Rolling Stone magazine, attorney Lauren Wolfe of Travelers United explained that the key issue is that Noem didn’t disclose the obvious ad.
“It’s very clear that anybody that promotes travel products, services, medical tourism, space, travel — anything like that — needs to say that something is an ad, an advertisement, or sponsored in the caption, and throughout essentially the video, according to the law,” she said.
“The issue here is that she should have disclosed that it was an ad, and just used that really simple language — ‘ad’ at the beginning of the caption — and maybe said in the video very briefly exactly what happened. If she got free services, if she was paid for it, just to be transparent, and that would have complied with the law,” she added.
If you want to promote medical tourism on social media in exchange for $ and/or free or reduced priced services, you can do that. Just make sure to put Ad as the first word in your caption to comply with the law. https://t.co/459DO4R8fR
— TravelersUnited.org (@TravelersOrg) March 13, 2024
In its complaint, Travelers United makes it clear that the lawsuit isn’t meant to be political and that the group has no beef with Noem outside of her not disclosing that the Smile Texas video was an ad. And indeed, if anything, it sounds as if the group generally supports her.
“Travelers United would like to make clear this lawsuit is merely a lawsuit over the lack of advertising disclosure,” the complaint says. “Governor Kristi Noem has had many accomplishments in office and Travelers United hopes that after correcting her social media posts she continues to do her job of making her great state even better.”
The complaint concludes by asking for a judge to impose an order forcing Noem to comply with the law — specifically the District of Columbia Consumer Protection Procedures Act (CPPA) — and pay a punitive fee.
“Our goal is just to get her to correct the posts, not any sort of massive penalties or anything like that,” Wolfe emphasized in a separate statement to Mediaite.
However, she also admitted that Travelers United doesn’t yet have any direct evidence that the South Dakota governor received compensation of any kind for the Smile Texas ad she recorded.
“It’s possible there is none, but it doesn’t make any sense otherwise. We look forward to seeing that information in court,” she said.
View the complaint in its entirety below:
Click this link for the original source of this article.
Author: Vivek Saxena
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