The super PAC affiliated with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer is targeting Colorado voters with a digital advertisement that accuses Republican Sen. Cory Gardner of ignoring the rising danger of the coronavirus back home so that he could mingle with wealthy “socialites” in Florida.
Senate Majority PAC, or “SMP,” is investing “five figures” with Facebook and Google to run the spot as Democrats attempt to oust Gardner after just one term. The ad highlights a trip to Palm Beach in late February before the coronavirus was declared a pandemic and prior to social distancing and business closures. But SMP is using Gardner’s attendance at an opulent champagne and dinner reception to charge him with negligence as the coronavirus spread.
“Cory Gardner has shown time and again his loyalty is to the millionaires lining his campaign coffers and President Trump, not to his constituents,” Matt Corridoni, SMP spokesman, said in a statement.
The Gardner campaign countered that Democrats are using the pandemic to play politics. “It’s disgusting to see Chuck Schumer’s dark money super PAC attempt to use a public health crisis to score political points,” Gardner campaign spokesman Jerrod Dobkin told the Washington Examiner.
Gardner is running for reelection in a swing state that has voted Democrat for president in three consecutive elections and is expected to do so again this year. With President Trump’s weakness among the suburban voters that predominate in metropolitan Denver, Gardner is facing a particularly tough campaign. The tens of millions of dollars Democratic groups are spending against the senator are compounding his challenge.
This latest attack from SMP combines press reports of Gardner’s attendance at the dinner at a tony South Florida mansion with an ethics complaint filed by a Democratic state representative that claims the senator’s participation in the event amounted to a violation of the law regulating how much money in gifts federal lawmakers can accept.
However, Gardner did not accept any gifts from the hosts of the event, and his campaign covered the costs of his attendance, said Dobkin, his spokesman. The event, organized by Krug Champagne, was not a fundraiser. The digital ad from SMP implies otherwise.
Dobkin said the senator has been laser-focused on defeating the coronavirus.
“Senator Gardner called for the first COVID-19 Congressional briefing, and has secured masks, ventilators, and testing kits to save lives in Colorado,” Dobkin said. “This ethics complaint has already been called ‘frivolous’ because the Gardner campaign complied with FEC regulations and paid for Senator Gardner’s attendance at the event.
