Democrats push Biden to restart negative ads, despite Trump’s COVID diagnosis
An increasing number of Democrats are vocally urging Joe Biden’s campaign to resume running negative ads against Donald Trump, arguing that their party’s nominee should not relent even as the president remains hospitalized after contracting the coronavirus.
With Election Day less than a month away and early voting already in progress in key battleground states, some Democratic operatives said Biden must push forward with the messaging that has helped provide him with a stable lead in the presidential race, especially as the Trump campaign has continued to air attack ads.
“At this point, Biden must share truth and facts even if they paint Trump negatively,” said Amanda Renteria, who was the political director for Hillary Clinton’s campaign in 2016. “There is simply too much the public needs to know in the most important election in our lifetime. It is critical that Biden also vigorously proceeds.”
Biden’s campaign announced Friday that it would stop running negative ads against Trump, with the candidate tweeting that “this cannot be a partisan moment” after news broke that the president was going to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center to help treat his coronavirus infection. The move won praise from many Democrats, who lauded it as the kind of statesmanlike decision that voters want to see in this moment of national crisis.
But the move was not reciprocated by the Trump campaign, which has forged ahead with its anti-Biden ads. Now, the focus of many Democrats is increasingly turning back to an election many say is the most important of their lifetimes.
“Elections are the primary vehicle for holding our politicians accountable, and Trump and the Republicans must be held accountable, wrote Dan Pfeiffer, a former senior adviser to Barack Obama, in a post titled “Now is the time for politics.”
“They are too dumb and dangerous to be in charge of anything,” he continued. “We must do everything within our power to make sure they pay a steep political price that will never be forgotten.”
Kate Bedingfield, Biden’s deputy campaign manager, defended the decision to pull their negative ads Sunday, saying on ABC’s “This Week” that the campaign believed it was the right thing to do given the president’s serious condition.
“Obviously, Joe Biden is somebody who believes first and foremost in civility,” she said. “He’s somebody who believes we can treat each other with dignity and respect. And so, we made that decision when we heard the news about President Trump’s health.”
Asked directly whether that decision will last the rest of the race, Bedingfield said the campaign will “adjust that as we go.”
At the same time, the Trump campaign showed no signs of letting up its assault on the former vice president, arguing that the Biden campaign still ran digital and TV ads attacking the president over the weekend. It can take several days for ads to be cycled out of rotation.
“They got the ‘good guy’ headlines, then continued to bombard the president on the air waves,” said Trump campaign spokesperson Andrew Clark.
Trump aides pointed to Biden’s Friday speech in Michigan, when he charged that this would be the first modern presidency “to leave office with fewer jobs than when it began,” as a rationale to proceed with its attacks. As the president was on his way to the hospital, one Trump campaign fundraising email accused Biden of being “probably already asleep in his basement.”
In September, the Biden campaign spent nearly $95 million on broadcast and national TV ads, compared to just $41 million by the Trump campaign, according to the Wesleyan Media Project.
Meanwhile, other Democratic groups already appear poised to proceed with their multi-pronged attacks on Trump.
American Bridge, which just launched a new $4 million campaign in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin that uses a Trump voter to accuse the president of lying, has no plans to pause its advertising. Priorities USA, the largest super PAC backing Biden, has also not adjusted its advertising plans.
The continued negative assault from Democratic super PACs, coupled with Biden maintaining his own positive ads, have led some Democrats to conclude that the Democrat made the right call despite the Trump campaign’s approach.
Many Democrats have also argued that in an election where most voter impressions of Trump have long been calcified, there’s a greater need to focus messaging on Biden, his character and his policy agenda. Changing Americans’ opinion of Trump might be impossible, they say, but the electorate’s views of Biden remain malleable.
“Everyone knows the bad things about Trump,” said Matt Bennett, co-founder of the center-left think tank Third Way. “They need to know a bit more about Joe.”
Bennett urged the Biden campaign to “keep the high ground.”
Some Democrats also point out that many of Biden’s ads already put the focus on the former vice president, while others say the relentless focus on Trump’s health is all the negative attention necessary to maintain his comfortable lead in the race.
It remains unclear when the president will resume campaign activity, as doctors said he could be released from the hospital as early as Monday. Vice President Mike Pence is scheduled to hold an in-person rally in Arizona on Thursday, the day after his debate with Kamala Harris. And Biden is scheduled to be in Miami on Monday and in Arizona later in the week.
Biden holds a significant edge over Trump in polls nationally and in critical battleground states like Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan, and few if any Democratic strategists think his lead is in danger of shrinking even without negative ads.
But to some operatives working against Trump’s re-election, this moment provides an opportunity to not just maintain but widen Biden’s advantage. A Biden blowout could have serve consequences down the ballot, said Reed Galen, a co-founder of the anti-Trump group Lincoln Project.
“From our perspective, even if the president is in the hospital, there’s a lot of aiders and abettors out there in the U.S. Senate who have a lot to answer for,” Galen said.
With Trump unable to campaign and facing a severe financial deficit, he added, Democrats have a chance to engineer a huge victory over the GOP in November.
“Now is the time to finish them off,” Galen said.
Adam Wollner contributed.
This story was originally published October 4, 2020 at 1:45 PM with the headline "Democrats push Biden to restart negative ads, despite Trump’s COVID diagnosis."
