New attack ad hits Donald Trump where it hurts

On September 9th, Kamala Harris launched a new attack ad against Donald Trump, but this latest attempt to warn the American people against voting the former president back into the Oval Office was a bit different. 

The new political attack ad focused on letting the comments of several former high-level Trump administration officials explain why the former president shouldn't be allowed to lead the country again. 

“Take it from the people who worked for him: Donald Trump is a danger to our troops, our security, and our democracy,” Vice President Harris wrote on X alongside the video. “He should never again stand behind the seal of the President of the United States.” 

The ad began by noting that in 2016, Trump said he would only choose the best people to work in his White House but then quickly pointed out that many of those individuals were now against seeing Trump return to the presidency. 

Photo Credit: X @KamalaHarris

Four individuals were highlighted, including Trump’s former Vice President Mike Pence, as well as former Defense Secretary Mark Esper, former National Security Advisor John Bolton, and former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley. 

The New Republic noted the ad used footage of Vice President Pence speaking shortly after Trump’s original January 6th indictment was made public, which accused Trump of trying to pressure Pence into not certifying the 2020 election.

The ad highlighted Pence's statement: “Anyone who puts themself over the Constitution should never be president of the United States” and also included a clip from a March 2024 Fox News interview where he noted he would not be endorsing Trump. 

Former Trump Defense Secretary Mark Esper’s portion of the ad may have been the most damaging. It included his response to CNN’s Jake Tapper in a June 2023 interview about whether or not Trump could be trusted with the nation’s secrets again. 

“No, I mean, it’s just irresponsible action that places our service members at risk, places our nation’s security at risk. You cannot have these documents floating around,” Esper told Taper, a quote also republished by Politico. Former Trump National Security Advisor John Bolton had a similar warning. 

“Donald Trump will cause a lot of damage,” Bolton said during a September 5th, 2024 interview with CNN’s Kaitlan Collins on The Source. However, it is important to point out that the second half of his comments were not included in the ad. 

Bolton added that Trump wouldn’t be “an existential threat to American democracy” in a hypothetical second term before telling Collins: “If you really think that, you must think this country isn’t worth much… We’ve survived a lot worse than Donald Trump,” Bolton also noted. 

The new Harris ad also included a second interview with Bolton from October 2023 with CNN’s Jake Tapper in which he said: “The only thing he cares about is Donald Trump” as they discussed the former president. 

Former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley’s comments were also quite damaging in the ad. The video clipped his September 2023 remarks on the Constitution as he transferred his responsibilities as chairman to Air Force General. CQ Brown, Jr. 

“We don't take an oath to a king, or queen, or a tyrant or a dictator. And we don't take an oath to a wannabe dictator,” General Milley said during his farewell speech. It was a jab and speech that Politico noted was a sharp rebuke of Donald Trump. 

Whether or not the new ad will be effective has yet to be seen, but The New Republic pointed out that the ad not only carried a dire warning but included criticisms that “have a history of getting under Trump’s skin.”

“Take it from the people who knew him best: Donald Trump is a danger to our troops and our democracy. We can’t let him lead our country again,” the narrator of the ad concluded. However, with the race as close as it is as of September 10th, it's still likely that Trump could be voted into office again. 

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