The campaign arm of House Democrats is kicking off its coordinated TV ad spending next week by dropping $338,000 in three competitive races.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s largest reserve so far is $248,000 for Rep. Vicente Gonzalez Jr. (D-TX) in Texas’s 34th District, according to AdImpact.
Recommended Stories
The money will be welcome news for Gonzales, who told the Washington Examiner earlier on Thursday that he believed Democrats “should have already been on TV and everywhere else.”
When asked how important receiving monetary support from the DCCC was for his reelection campaign, Gonzales said it is “crucial” for “all frontliners.”
“We’re all concerned,” he said. “We’re trying to do all we can with what we have.”
The DCCC is also spending $57,000 to defend Rep. Shomari Figures (D-AL) in Alabama’s 2nd District, and $33,000 for Democrat Christina Hines, who is running for Michigan’s 10th District, according to AdImpact.
DCCC communications director Courtney Rice said in a statement to the Washington Examiner that the group is “making deliberate investments throughout the country in coordination with our nominees’ unprecedented fundraising strength to maximize our dollars across an incredibly expansive battlefield.”
Still, the money is a drop in the bucket when compared to how much the National Republican Congressional Committee has spent. The GOP campaign arm has nearly $8.7 million reserved for so-called coordinated ad buys starting this week. The DCCC is expected to ramp up its broadcast spending in the coming weeks.
The DCCC previously told the Washington Examiner that it has “deliberately invested early in digital and mail communications in order to maximize our dollars across an incredibly expansive battlefield, before going up on TV in coordination with candidates in the final two months of the election.”
HOUSE GOP FLEXES CAMPAIGN CASH ADVANTAGE WITH AD BARRAGE AFTER SUPREME COURT RULING
The Supreme Court ruled earlier this year that unlimited coordinated spending between political parties and candidates is legal, deeming infringement upon it a violation of a party’s free speech rights. The ruling was advantageous for Republicans, who have amassed a significant war chest this cycle, and could helped candidates offset individual fundraising deficits.
However, an appeals court ruled last week that coordinated ad buys between political parties and joint fundraising committees are not entitled to lower candidate TV ad rates, a decision that marked a setback for Republicans and how far their cash can go. That decision was in response to a Democratic lawsuit and is being appealed by Republicans to the Supreme Court.
