David Pryor Appears In New Mark Pryor Senate Ad

Former Arkansas Senator, Congressman and Governor David Pryor appears in a new TV ad with his son, incumbent Democratic Sen. Mark Pryor, discussing Mark’s battle with cancer and insurance companies.

In the ad, David Pryor says, “When Mark was diagnosed with cancer, we thought we might lose him.”

In 1997, Mark Pryor was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer called clear-cell sarcoma. The aggressive cancer impacts about 20 people in the U.S. annually. It was in his Achilles tendon, which Pryor detected while playing basketball.

Pryor went through a 13-hour experimental surgery that resulted in a successful recovery and avoidance of an amputation of his lower leg.

In the new TV ad, titled “Cancer,” Mark Pryor notes the conflict he had with his insurance company in paying his medical bills, an experience that he said led to his support for the federal health care law.

“No one should be fighting an insurance company while you’re fighting for your life,” Pryor says in the ad. “That’s why I helped pass a law to prevent insurance companies from canceling your policy if you get sick or deny coverage for pre-existing conditions.”

Pryor referenced the same example of an insurance company fight over his medical bills in an earlier TV interview with KATV’s Elicia Dover in a segment that appeared on Talk Business & Politics in early August.

You can view the TV ad, which is airing statewide and includes a six-figure media buy, in the video below.

The ad is the first TV ad that has included Pryor’s father, David. Pryor’s opponent, Republican Cong. Tom Cotton, has also aired ads that include his father and mother earlier in the campaign.