President Joe Biden's re-election campaign announced $14 million in new spending across battleground states on Wednesday as it launched an ad attacking former President Donald Trump on health care.
The campaign said the spending includes seven targeted minorities this month through TV, digital and radio ads, leveraging an early fundraising advantage over Republican presidential nominee Trump. He says he is trying. The move also follows a $30 million advertising campaign in battleground states that began after Biden's State of the Union address in March.
A key element of the spending push is a new ad listing President Trump's past efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare.
“Health care should be a fundamental right,” Biden says in the ad. “Guys, he's here to take care of your health. We're not going to allow that.”
It's all part of a broader strategy by the Biden campaign to use its fundraising advantage to flood battleground states with advertising and field staff. While Mr. Biden is also campaigning in these core states, Mr. Trump is stuck in a New York City courtroom most weekdays as he defends himself in a criminal case involving hush-money payments.
Biden's re-election effort has focused on protecting abortion rights, and the new focus on health care makes him vulnerable, especially Trump's attacks on the 2010 Affordable Care Act. This reflects the long-held view of the same camp. Popularity. Leaning into the broader issue of health care also allows Mr. Biden to tout related achievements, such as capping the price of insulin for seniors at $35 a month.
“We're talking about high stakes, but the stakes couldn't be higher for Americans who rely on the Affordable Care Act,” Biden campaign spokesman Michael Tyler said on a call with reporters this week. I don't think that's possible,” he said. “This is a message that we will be fully committed from May through the summer.”
The Biden administration announced in January that a record 20 million people purchased health insurance through the Affordable Care Act's Marketplace this year.
President Trump unsuccessfully tried to invalidate the ACA during his administration, including at the Supreme Court. In November he declared that “Obamacare sucks!” He said he wanted to exchange on social media. A few months later, in March, he said, “I will not end the ACA because the crooked Joe Budden is constantly misrepresenting information and providing misinformation.”
Last month, President Trump insisted he had no intention of repealing the ACA and would instead improve it.
“We're going to make the ACA much better than it is today, and we're going to make it cheaper for you,” he said in the video.
Although less than six months have passed since the election, he has yet to reveal the exact method.
The campaign says Biden and his surrogates have been aggressively hitting core states this month, with Biden visiting Wisconsin on Wednesday and visiting Georgia and Michigan next week. Biden won all three states in 2020.
The campaign said it was using the large-scale fundraising to expand its state operations.
“By the end of this month, we will have at least 200 offices and 500 staff,” said Dan Kanninen, the campaign's battleground state director. “The Trump campaign has virtually no presence in most battleground states. If they decide to do any organizing work, they will almost certainly have a presence in the communities where they are knocking on doors.” You will have to rely on costly last-minute tactics with people who are not available.”
The Trump campaign disputes claims that it is not deploying personnel to critical states.
“The premise that there are no paid employees in battleground states is simply false,” Caroline Leavitt, Trump's national press secretary, said in a statement last month. “We have field programs in every battleground state with paid staff and volunteers, and they are expanding every day. Therefore, we do not announce all the organization's movements in the media.
NBC News reported last month that the Trump campaign and Republican National Committee each had fewer than five employees in each battleground state.
The presidential election remains close despite Biden's likely advantage in staffing, advertising and fundraising. An NBC News poll in April showed President Trump holding a narrow 2 percentage point lead among registered voters, within the margin of error.
