When Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul debuts his next campaign ad in Iowa, the credit will go to his supporters.
The Republican presidential hopeful has asked “liberty-loving filmmakers” to develop their own advertisements for air in the early primary state ahead of the 2016 Iowa caucuses and submit them to his campaign by Oct. 31. Paul announced the crowdsourcing initiative on Snapchat, a social app he frequently uses to share his message with young voters.
“This is the first time this has ever been done on the presidential level,” Paul’s chief digital strategist Vincent Harris told CNN. “Not every campaign on both sides of the aisle can do this successfully.”
According to the campaign, the ad can be no longer than 35 seconds and must promote one of three components central to the Kentucky senator’s platform: his pledge to “Defeat the Washington Machine;” defense of privacy rights and fight to end the National Security Agency’s domestic spying program; or his plan to replace the existing personal income tax with a “Fair and Flat Tax” of 14.5 percent.
Once campaign staffers narrow down the entries to a select few that stood out to them, the public will be able to vote to select the ultimate winner. Paul’s campaign noted that the eventual victor will not be compensated for his or her video.
In addition to targeting young voters with the ad contest, Paul, who’s tenth in the Washington Examiner’s presidential power rankings, will visit 11 different college campuses in Iowa from Oct. 12-14.
The Kentucky Republican currently polls toward the bottom of the GOP pack, earning just 2.3 percent support among GOP voters in the latest RealClearPolitics polling average.
