GOP establishment steps in with massive ad buy for Morse
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Sep. 1—As retired Brig. Gen. Don Bolduc commands the field in the GOP primary race for U.S. Senate, the national Republican establishment has formed a Super PAC to spend more than $4 million in support of state Senate President Chuck Morse's candidacy.
Les Williamson, a former staffer for the National Republican Senatorial Committee who also worked for a Mitch McConnell political action committee, created the White Mountain PAC of Houston, Texas.
Starting Thursday, the group will start airing pro-Morse ads on border security in the Boston, New Hampshire and Portland, Maine, media markets.
Initially the buy was $2.6 million, but was bumped up to $4.1 million Wednesday night.
"Joe Biden's failure at the border is literally killing us in New Hampshire," says the ad text the Union Leader has obtained. "The cartels bring drugs, crime and death here. Chuck Morse is fighting back. His plan? Finish the border wall, stop Biden's catch and release policy, get tough on immigration lawbreakers."
The ad also mentions that the Union Leader and the NRA have endorsed Morse, a Salem Republican.
"Chuck Morse, one tough conservative," the ad concludes.
The ads represent more than three times what Morse raised in his entire campaign through last June. Two-time candidate Bolduc, a political outsider from Stratham, had raised less than $500,000 by that time.
The super PAC and massive TV buy emerged the same day a University of New Hampshire Survey Center poll came out that showed Bolduc with a 43% to 22% lead over Morse, with the three other candidates at 5% or less.
The Bolduc campaign said nothing could rescue Morse's campaign.
"This is a last ditch and losing effort by the establishment to prop up one of their own. This move is only going to backfire with grassroots voters who are drawn to General Bolduc precisely because he is an outsider offering a fresh perspective and running a quintessential New Hampshire campaign," the campaign said in a statement.
"If the Washington establishment had any juice left in the tank, Chuck Morse would be running away with the race. Instead, he's staring down a two to one deficit with less than two weeks to go."
A spokesperson for the New Hampshire Democratic Party said it looks desperate.
"Mitch McConnell and national Republicans are intervening in the Republican Senate primary because their handpicked candidate Chuck Morse is failing with just two weeks left until the primary," said Gates MacPherson. "This massive intervention shows just how desperate Mitch McConnell and national Republicans are to push their handpicked candidate over the finish line."
The Morse campaign declined comment on the ads.
Gov. Chris Sununu has called Bolduc a "conspiracy-type candidate." Bolduc endorsed Trump's claims Biden-backed election workers stole the 2020 election.
If Sununu takes sides, he's likely to go with Morse since they've worked together for a decade and both come from the same hometown.
Some political analysts have questioned this strategy of trying to win by flooding the airwaves with ads pumping up Morse.
They said the Morse campaign or his allies have to come out on the attack and try to drive up the negatives of Bolduc, who has been running for three years for the Senate and is popular among Trump supporters.
"Bolduc is closing in on this; you've got to give voters a reason not to pick him," said Neil Levesque, executive director of the New Hampshire Institute for Politics prior to this latest ad buy.
Bolduc's favorability in the UNH poll was plus 30% while Morse's was only plus 14%.
While the ads emphasize Morse's position on border security, the Union Leader reported Morse's landscaping firm did not join E-Verify, the voluntary, federal program that tracks illegal immigrants for private employers.
The national landscaping industry opposes E-Verify, but three dozen landscaping companies in the state are members, including the one owned by the husband of Republican former U.S. Sen. Kelly Ayotte.
Morse said he has never hired illegals and has a program that rigorously screens all prospective workers.
AdImpact, which tracks industry spending trends, reports most of the pro-Morse ads will be on Boston TV, where airtime costs more than on stations in New Hampshire and Maine.
Massachusetts hosts its primary next Tuesday, leaving the prime time airwaves clear in the final week before New Hampshire's Sept. 13 primary.
