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Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) unveiled a bizarre new ad for her campaign for Tennessee governor on Wednesday in which she crushes fortune cookies to show how she will treat China.
But there’s one glaring flaw in the ad, which critics have denounced as racist: Much of the imagery she’s using to show how she’ll “crush” China isn’t even Chinese.
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“How hard am I gonna crack down on China?” Blackburn, who has dodged in-person town halls for nearly a decade, asks in the video. “Well, here’s a clue.”
With that, she begins crushing fortune cookies with her fingers as the narrator talks up how tough she is as well as how closely she works with President Donald Trump.
“It doesn’t take a fortune cookie to figure it out. Here in Tennessee, we’re going to stop communist China and protect Tennessee land,” Blackburn, who had an awkward moment at an elevator last week, states at the end of the video, with her hands atop a pile of crushed fortune cookie remains.
Marsha Blackburn and her crushed cookie remains. Marsha Blackburn
Except fortune cookies aren’t from China.
The cookies as we know them today are largely an American invention, although they have roots in Japan.
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But there’s one place you won’t typically find fortune cookies: China.
“They are seldom found in China, primarily because they are not inherently Chinese,” the South China Morning Post noted in 2024. “There is not even a universally recognised Chinese equivalent word for the English term ‘fortune cookies.'”
The ad also has another cultural mix-up: The waving “lucky cat” at the end is a “maneki-neko,” or “beckoning cat,” also from Japan, although they’re often seen in Chinese homes and businesses as well.
Even the soy sauce on the table, Kikkoman, is a Japanese brand.
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And if the hodgepodge of imagery wasn’t enough for Blackburn to get her point across, the ad ends with a gong sound.
Critics crushed Blackburn over the bizarre imagery and for an ad many are calling racist:
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