Mike Pence Launches $3M Ad Blitz in Swing States to Target One Candidate

Former Vice President Mike Pence is taking the gloves off, launching a $3 million ad campaign to target Kamala Harris’s economic policies in swing states like Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Montana. Through his conservative advocacy group, Advancing American Freedom, Pence aims to drive home one point: Harris’s proposed tax hikes will be a disaster for the American economy.

These ads don’t hold back, calling attention to the benefits of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act that Pence helped enact alongside President Trump. In one ad, AnnMarie Nelms, a restaurant owner from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, talks about how the Republican tax cuts fueled an economic boom in her area. “If they raise our taxes, a lot of the small-business owners that I know won’t make it more than a year,” she warns. Nelms doesn’t mince words about her concerns with Harris’s plan to “ram through the largest tax increase in American history.”

The ads also take aim at Democratic Senators in key battleground states. For example, they go after Senator Bob Casey of Pennsylvania and Senator Jon Tester of Montana, both of whom voted against the 2017 tax cuts. Liane Taylor, a real estate broker from Montana, echoes the sentiments of small-business owners across the country, pointing out that “rent and mortgage rates were affordable” before the current administration took over. She argues that the tax cuts were a boon for middle-class Americans and that raising taxes now would be a huge setback.

Backing up this ad blitz, Advancing American Freedom has distributed a “messaging memo” to GOP candidates, suggesting they emphasize the economic growth spurred by the 2017 tax cuts. The memo highlights that, under Trump’s administration, real median household income reached an all-time high of $78,250 in 2019. And let’s not forget about job creation—according to AAF, the tax cuts helped add over 5 million jobs to the economy before the pandemic hit.

Polling conducted by AAF found that 58% of Americans support keeping taxes low, including a surprising 43% of Democrats. Meanwhile, a recent analysis from the nonpartisan Tax Foundation projected that Harris’s economic agenda could cost the U.S. 786,000 jobs, shrink long-term GDP by 2%, and reduce wages by 1.2%. Add $4.1 trillion to the national debt, and you have a recipe for economic disaster, according to these critics.

It’s clear Pence isn’t pulling any punches here. With ads rolling out in key swing states, he’s making sure voters know the stakes if Harris’s multitrillion-dollar tax hike becomes a reality. Whether or not it resonates, this campaign strategy signals a broader push from Republicans to frame this election as a referendum on economic policy.