Hillary Clinton expects to face a Republican super PAC 'avalanche' — and she just launched a preemptive strike
Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton will launch her first 2016 presidential campaign ads on Tuesday. Both commercials, which will air in the early primary states of Iowa and New Hampshire, focus on illuminating details from Clinton's biography.
"Both 60-second ads – 'Dorothy' and 'Family Strong'– combine to tell the story of Hillary Clinton as a tenacious fighter for families. In keeping with a theme from Clinton's launch speech in June, the ads ground Clinton's commitment to public service in the story of how her mother overcome her abandonment as a child due, in part, to the kindness of others," the campaign's statement announcing the ads said.
In a conversation with Business Insider on Sunday evening, a Clinton campaign aide said the ads are designed to counter a coming "avalanche" of negative attacks from Republican super PACs. According to the aide, Clinton's campaign expects these GOP PAC commercials will begin airing in the fall after Labor Day and they estimate at least $34 million worth of airtime has been purchased for these attack ads in the first four primary states.
"Hillary Clinton is going to be the subject of the most intense and well-funded attack machine in the history of presidential politics. We are not going to let the Republicans succeed in their attempts to define her before she has the chance to take her own, positive message to the voters in Iowa and New Hampshire," the aide said.
In her first ad, "Dorothy," Clinton describes her mother's story as the main reason she has pursued a political career.
"When I think about why I’m doing this I think about my mother Dorothy. She was abandoned by her parents at the age of eight, sent from Chicago to LA to live with grandparents who didn’t want her. But people showed her kindness, gave her a chance. Like the teacher who saw my mother had no money for food and started bringing her extra from home," Clinton says in the commercial, adding, "When she needed a champion someone was there. I think about all the Dorothy’s all over America who fight for their families, who never give up. That’s why I’m doing this. That’s why I’ve always done this."
The second ad, "Family Strong," alludes to Clinton's mother, but it primarily focuses on Clinton's own story and casts her as an advocate for children and families. Specifically, the ad highlights her work for the Children's Defense Fund after she finished law school and lists other causes she backed after entering the political realm.
"In Arkansas, she fought for school reform to change lives forever. Then as first lady she helped get health care for eight million kids," a narrator says in the commercial, adding, "The senator who made sure the heroes and families of 9/11 got the care they needed. The Secretary of State who joined the cabinet of the man who defeated her, because when your President calls you serve. And now a new title: grandma."
The Clinton campaign said, so far, it spent $1 million in each of the two states to air the ads for five weeks. View both of the ads below.
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