Obama releases a new TV ad entitled "Go" as polls show the presidential race tightening.
As the presidential race tightens, President Obama will spend $25 million this month on advertising.President Obama’s reelection campaign announced Monday that it will spend $25 million in advertising this month, which will include airing a new television ad in nine key states.
The minute-long ad, entitled “Go,” portrays Obama as a president who inherited a desolate economy – with rising unemployment and foreclosures – and has started to turn it around.
“Some said our best days were behind us,” the narrator states, over a shot of a Tea Party rally. “But not him.”
“He believed in us. Fought for us,” the narrator says, over pictures of American workers. The ad goes on to detail Obama’s major accomplishments: bailing out the U.S. auto industry, killing Osama bin Laden, bringing troops home from Iraq and creating jobs.
The ad also reflects the fine line the Democratic president must walk between touting his accomplishments and acknowledging that many Americans are still struggling financially. “We’re not there yet… it’s still too hard for too many,” the ad states. “But we’re coming back.”
The ad will air in Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Nevada, New Hampshire, Iowa, North Carolina, Florida and Colorado. Obama senior adviser David Axelrod told reporters today that the campaign will spend $25 million on ads this month.
Amanda Henneberg, campaign spokeswoman for presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney, said, “Americans will hear a lot from President Obama in the coming months, but what they won’t hear from him is the fact that his policies have wreaked havoc on the middle class. After a doubling of gas prices, declining incomes, millions of foreclosures and record levels of unemployment, Americans know they’re not better off than they were four years ago.”
The new advertising comes as polls find the presidential race tightening. A national poll by Politico and George Washington University found Romney and Obama in a dead heat, with Romney edging Obama 48 percent to 47 percent, within the poll’s margin of error.
Romney opened up a 10-point lead among independent voters – a vital constituency in the 2012 election. The poll found that voters thought Obama would do a better job on foreign policy and standing up for the middle class, but were split on which candidate would do a better job dealing with jobs and the economy. The poll of 1,000 likely voters was conducted April 29-May 3 and has a margin of error of 3.1 percent.
A poll by USA Today also found Obama and Romney essentially tied – with Obama at 47 percent and Romney at 45 percent – in a dozen key swing states.
For the first time since the fall, Democrats said they were more enthusiastic about voting than Republicans. The poll found that voters overwhelmingly see Obama as more likeable than Romney, but see Romney as equally capable of managing the government and slightly better able to handle the economy. The poll of 951 voters was conducted April 26-May 2 and has a margin of error of 4 percent.