It’s no surprise to anyone who has been paying attention that America’s major cities are in big trouble. Homelessness, drugs, crime, discarded needles, feces, and urine on the streets; so many of our traditionally Democrat-ruled, urban areas are just plain melting down.
Now the Trump/Vance campaign has a new ad out targeting one of these major urban areas, one in a key swing state: Philadelphia.
NEW: Trump campaign just launched this digital ad on Google targeting specific counties in PA.
The ad, called “Forgotten Cities”, interviews 2 Philly residents about the challenges of the city. Both blame Biden and Harris for the issues.
“Today everyone is struggling.” pic.twitter.com/YIO7sr9BQ6
— Andrew Arenge (@MrArenge) August 9, 2024
The ad itself is interesting; it presents two Philadelphia residents, both black, talking about the damage the Biden/Harris administration has done to their neighborhoods. The ad not only portrays the two speakers, but also street scenes of life in Philadelphia today, including crowds of homeless people clogging the sidewalks, people obviously strung out on drugs, and so on.
It’s a persuasive message. And it’s based on the actual conditions in Philadelphia today. They literally have the video.
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This is an effort that should be taken nationwide, and there are several good arguments for spending some campaign resources to do so.
First: Philadelphia’s problems are the problems of many of our Democrat-run urban strongholds. Those street scenes from Philadelphia may be duplicated in so many other places – Baltimore, Chicago, Detroit, Denver, Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and more. There are just so many places, sadly, that a campaign team could harvest hours of compelling video showing how parts of these cities, Democrat strongholds all, are no longer livable.
Second: An ad campaign that appeals to the suffering, law-abiding voters in those cities could make some serious inroads. Could the Trump/Vance ticket flip those cities red? It’s doubtful, but flipping a small percentage of urban voters in a state like Pennsylvania, Michigan, or even Minnesota, states where the Democrat urban areas are offset by the conservative outlying areas, may well make a difference in where those states Electoral College votes.
Third: Donald Trump has made the habit of taking the fight to first Joe Biden and then Kamala Harris on what the Democrats consider safe ground. Since the convention, JD Vance seems to be adopting much the same strategy. This is a move that Sun Tzu or Carl von Clausewitz would have approved of. In any conflict, one of the keys to winning is to take the fight to the enemy on their ground, to make them react to you, not the other way around; victory generally goes to the side that defines the terms of the conflict and defines and shapes the battlespace. The Trump/Vance should be that side; to win, they have to take the initiative and hold it. Making the Democrats spend campaign money to defend traditionally Democrat urban strongholds is part of that, not to mention Donald Trump holding rallies in places like the South Bronx.
Fourth and finally: Don’t rule out the down-ticket races. It remains to be seen what kind of coattails the Trump/Vance ticket will have, but it’s important to note that most of the policies that are causing these cities to melt down are local or state-level policies. These cities can’t be fixed without fixing the municipal and state governments as well as the national government.
This is an interesting ad campaign. We’ll see, very soon, exactly how strong a play the Trump/Vance campaign will make for these cities.
