President Biden’s reelection campaign launched a digital ad highlighting former President Trump’s comments that there will be a “blood bath” if he isn’t elected and other rhetoric from the GOP rival.
The short ad features Trump telling supporters, “Now, if I don’t get elected, it’s going to be a blood bath. It’s going to be a blood bath for the country.”
It then featured other comments from Trump, such as when the former president said there were “very fine people on both sides” after the violence in Charlottesville, Va., in 2017, and when he was asked in a 2020 presidential debate if he was willing to condemn militia groups and white supremacists and replied, “Proud Boys, stand back and stand by.”
Trump’s comments about a “blood bath,” which were at a rally in Ohio on Saturday for GOP Senate candidate Bernie Moreno, have sparked outrage that he was threatening violence like what was seen during the Jan. 6, 2021, riots at the U.S. Capitol, if he loses to Biden in November.
The ad also played audio from a recent Trump rally, when a loudspeaker voice said, “Please rise for the horribly and unfairly treated January 6 hostages.” It included Trump saying there will “absolutely” be pardons and commutations of Jan. 6 defendants, and another moment when he didn’t respond to a question about whether he would tell his supporters not to incite violence.
“Stop Trump. JoeBiden.com,” the ad reads.
Biden responded to the blood bath comments on social media, saying that it’s “clear” Trump wants another Jan. 6. Meanwhile, Trump and his allies have claimed the president was talking about the auto industry with his rhetoric.
The new ad is part of an ongoing strategy by the Biden campaign to push out pieces of Trump’s rhetoric that they deem dangerous, hoping that making people pay more attention to what Trump says will turn independents and swing voters to Biden.