New Harris Ad Specifically Trolls Mar-a-Lago

VP's campaign is paying for spot on Project 2025 to appear on Trump's home turf in Florida
By Jenn Gidman,  Newser Staff
Posted Aug 30, 2024 7:35 AM CDT

"Donald Trump's back, and he's out for control—complete control. And he has a plan to get it." That's the gist of the latest political ad from the Kamala Harris campaign on her opponent for the Oval Office. Trump, whom she ties to Project 2025, a right-wing policy initiative published by the Heritage Foundation. But it's not the TV ad itself that's so unusual—rather, it's the Harris camp's strategy on where to air it. Per USA Today, the one-minute ad will appear in seven battleground states, but also in one small section of Florida: the Palm Beach-Fort Pierce area, conveniently where Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate is located.

The ad, which calls Project 2025 a "922-page blueprint to make Donald Trump the most powerful president ever," features clips of Trump promising to wield power "very aggressively" and speaking about vengeance. "Revenge does take time," he says in one snippet. "And sometimes revenge can be justified." But the Bulwark notes that "the ad placement itself was the message," as the Harris campaign isn't spending ad money anywhere else in Florida—just where Trump will be likely to stumble across it while channel surfing at Mar-a-Lago.

The ad is part of a larger $370 million media blitz that the Harris campaign is rolling out between Labor Day and Election Day. The Bulwark notes that the Lincoln Project, an anti-Trump group founded by moderate conservatives and ex-GOPers, first came up with the concept in 2020 of scooping up ad time just to "get inside Trump's head," with founder Rick Wilson calling it an "audience of one" ad. "We wanted him to see it and anyone else around Mar-a-Lago to see it," Wilson said, adding, "The most devious thing we did was run it on the Golf Channel." (More Kamala Harris 2024 stories.)

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