GOP group launches ad blitz to save Senate

by Jonathan Swan - 09/13/16 3:52 PM ET

A super-PAC run by allies of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) launched its fall advertising campaign Tuesday, bombing Democratic Senate candidates with more than $35 million in attack ads.

Democratic Senate candidates running in New Hampshire, Missouri, Indiana, North Carolina, and Nevada will be facing brutal new television and digital ads courtesy of the Senate Leadership Fund (SLF).

{mosads}The biggest portion of SLF’s campaign, $15.8 million, goes to New Hampshire, where incumbent Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R) is fighting off Democratic Gov. Maggie Hassan.

The new N.H. ad, launched in partnership between SLF and a local super-PAC called Granite State Solutions, is titled “Ridiculous” and hits Hassan over her tax-and-spend record. It will run on broadcast and cable TV, and digital.

SLF’s next biggest spend, $8.1 million, goes to North Carolina to help Republican Sen. Richard Burr against his Democratic challenger Deborah Ross. An ad titled “Tuition” alleges that Ross’s rhetoric on education funding doesn’t match her record.

In Nevada, Rep. Joe Heck (R-Nev.) has a dead heat race against Democrat Catherine Cortez Masto for an open seat. SLF has dropped $6 million behind an ad titled “No Idea,” which makes the brutal claim that as attorney general of the state, Cortez Masto “failed Nevada rape victims” because thousands of rape kits weren’t sent for DNA analysis during her term as the state’s top law official.

SLF is acting in Indiana, where Republicans are worried about losing a seat to popular Democrat Evan Bayh.

The group’s $4 million campaign — running an ad that drills Bayh for supporting Obamacare — sends much-needed reinforcement to Republican nominee Todd Young, who trails Bayh by 5.5 points, according to a RealClearPolitics average.

In Missouri, SLF is spending $2.5 million to snuff out the hopes the Democrat Jason Kander, who’s up against Republican incumbent Sen. Roy Blunt. The ad, titled “Curtain,” paints Kander as a liberal camouflaging himself with centrist rhetoric.

SLF is the biggest outside group helping Republicans hold onto the Senate. Beyond the five battlegrounds mentioned in this article, SLF will soon be launching new ads in Florida ($10 million), Ohio ($5 million) and Pennsylvania ($6.5 million), said communications director Ian Prior.

The super-PAC has reserved a total of about $60 million so far this cycle, Prior said. And an affiliated non-profit group, One Nation, has spent about $25 million so far on “issue ads,” he added.

Tags Kelly Ayotte Mitch McConnell Richard Burr Roy Blunt Todd Young