After dropping hints at their displeasure for Donald Trump, the Club for Growth is taking him on directly this week (Washington Post).
Club for Growth President David McIntosh unveiled a pair of TV ads for reporters at a news conference in Washington. One accuses Trump of being a closet liberal and shows images of Democratic contenders Bernie Sanders and Hillary Rodham Clinton. The other charges Trump “supports eminent domain abuse.”
McIntosh said the ads, which are being aired by Club for Growth Action, the organization’s super PAC, will hit TV airwaves later this week.
“He’s playing [voters] for chumps,” McIntosh said of Trump.
Left out of the WaPo‘s description are the issues CFG emphasizes: Trump’s past support for government-monopoly health care, higher taxes, TARP, and Kelo-like eminent domain seizures.
As an economic conservative (who – full disclosure – is backing another Republican: Marco Rubio), I am especially glad to see this, but I have two problems.
First – outside of Trump’s Kelo quote, the specifics aren’t there. Granted, one can’t squeeze it all into a 30-second ad, but citing sources on the above issues shouldn’t be too hard.
More worrisome is the decision to air the ads in Iowa. I get that Iowa is first on the nomination list, but it is also far less fertile ground for economic conservatism in general. New Hampshire, like much of the northeast, is where Republicans and conservatives define themselves via economic issues – and I humbly submit the advertising effort would bear more fruit there.
Still, Trump has been able to glide on Republican anger with the establishment wing of the party for months. Now, an organization that has battled the GOP Establishment wing since before Trump’s dalliance with Ross Perot’s Reform Party is taking aim at him.
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