Republican presidential contenders Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis are escalating their attacks on each other in a last-ditch effort to close in on frontrunner Donald Trump less than a month before the party’s first nominating contest in Iowa.
Groups aligned with Haley and DeSantis have flooded the Iowa airwaves with negative spots as the two candidates vie for second place – both trail Trump by a wide margin. The Haley-allied super political action committee SFA Fund has increasingly paid for negative ads against DeSantis. Sixty percent of the ads funded by the group in December attacked the Florida governor, up from 41% last month, according to AdImpact.
Fight Right, the super PAC founded by DeSantis allies, has three different ads criticizing Haley on the air in Iowa, and has already aired twice as many negative ads as it did in November. Both super PACs have surged spending with fewer than four weeks until Iowa’s Jan. 15 caucuses.
The ad war – which is being waged on TV, radio and online – comes as the two candidates trail the former president by more than 30 percentage points in Iowa. A third-place finish there for DeSantis, whose team has proclaimed that an alternative to Trump would emerge from the state, would undermine his already struggling campaign. Topping DeSantis could be a springboard for Haley, who is polling second in New Hampshire, which holds its primary before her home state of South Carolina votes third, on Feb 24.
SFA Fund spent an estimated $1.4 million in the past two weeks in Iowa, running a commercial claiming that DeSantis imitates Trump and calling the Florida governor a “phony” who’s “too weak” to win. Fight Right has poured $1 million into a new spot that likens Haley, a former United Nations Ambassador, to Hillary Clinton, the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee.
So far, $98.5 million has been spent in the state, more than triple the amount Republicans spent ahead of the 2016 caucuses. Ads on behalf of Haley and DeSantis make up more than half that total. Trump and the groups supporting him have benefited from his high name identification and strong lead in the polls, and have only spent $14.3 million on advertising.
Bryan Griffin, a spokesman for DeSantis’ campaign, said Haley “is so committed to her VP ambitions that she refuses to spend a dime” attacking Trump. The Trump and Haley campaigns didn’t respond to requests to comment. SFA Fund, the super PAC supporting Haley, and Fight Right, which is backing DeSantis, also did not respond to requests to comment.
In an appeal to more conservative voters, Fight Right’s ads paint Haley as a flip-flopper who’s taken positions similar to those of Clinton. Another ad that’s run nearly 1,000 times in Iowa features audio of JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon urging attendees at an event in New York last month to help position Haley as a viable alternative to Trump. “Even if you’re a very liberal Democrat, I urge you, you know, to help Nikki Haley too,” he says in the clip.
Haley’s allies at SFA Fund are hammering their claim that there’s little daylight between Trump and DeSantis on issues, attitude and even mannerisms. The messaging and positioning of the attack ads show that both camps are trying to peel away votes from the other.
Jim Clark, 73, of Marshalltown, Iowa, said he’s noticed an increase in Haley ads on YouTube.
“For a while, the Trump campaign was on there saying we need to get Trump back in because everything was rosy and good and wonderful,” Clark said. “And now I’ve noticed just recently that same space is being taken up by Nikki Haley, and that tells me she has money to spend.”
Bloomberg writers Hadriana Lowenkron and Stephanie Lai contributed to this report.
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