Republicans for the Rule of Law on Thursday dropped another scathing video

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Republican Coronavirus Supercut Serves Up Words For Trump To Eat

Mary Papenfuss

HuffPostMarch 19, 2020

Republicans for the Rule of Law on Thursday dropped another scathing video about President Donald Trump, this time ridiculing his remark that he was battling the coronavirus threat right from the start — when the rest of us heard him calling it a “hoax.”

The ad will run Friday morning during “Fox & Friends” on Fox News.

In the video, Trump insists that 15 cases in the U.S. last month would quickly drop to “close to zero,” that they would be gone by April or would disappear “like a miracle.” Trump’s economic adviser Larry Kudlow insisted in a clip from last month that the coronavirus was “contained” (and later urged American to “stay at work”) before anyone died of the illness. The U.S. death toll was at least 150, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

As Trump and Kudlow speak, a meter keeps ratcheting up the number of coronavirus cases in the U.S. from one in late January to 6,421 as of March 15. (As of Thursday there were more than 14,200 cases.)

The video ends with the screen message: “America needs a president who tells the truth,” adding: “Our lives depend on it.”

Leaders communicating during times of crisis need to “be first, be right, be credible,” said a statement from the anti-Trump group led by conservative commentator Bill Kristol. “President Trump has often been first, but he had seldom been right — and he has never been credible,” it added. 

Check out the video up top.

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A brutal new ad uses Trump’s own words against him

It’s often argued that we must avoid “politicizing” crises like the current coronavirus catastrophe. But if anything can bury this cliche once and for all — “politicizing” a crisis really means debating our differences over what to do about one — this one should get the job done.

After all, the epic disaster we’re living through now just inescapably does underscore the enormous stakes in 2020, since the mass disruptions and suffering it will cause are in no small part a direct consequence of President Trump’s leadership failures and even his pathologies.

Indeed, in this case, Trump’s own words tell much of this story. They illustrate those stakes, and those failures and pathologies, as clearly as anything else does.

A new ad campaign from the Democratic-aligned super PAC American Bridge, which has been sent my way, uses those words in just this way.

The group is set to air digital spots in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin — the three “blue wall” states Trump cracked in 2016 — that document an extensive array of times that Trump minimized coronavirus, falsely downplayed the threat it posed and absurdly hyped his own handling of it.

Here’s the 60-second version of the spot:

Among the Trump quotes highlighted in the ads, which also will appear in a 30-second version:

• “We have it under control.”
• “This is their new hoax.”
• “The country’s in great shape. The market’s in great shape.”
• “I don’t take responsibility at all.”
• “I’d rate it a 10. I think we’ve done a great job.”

As the ad airs those quotes, in the corner of the screen the numbers of reported coronavirus cases continue to climb.

The ad buy is part of an ongoing $850,000 digital ad buy in those three crucial states. The first buy on these new spots is five figures, but this is an important marker, because it shows how Democrats will make the case against Trump on coronavirus in the context of the presidential race — and this messaging will all but certainly get amplified with more spending in coming weeks.

Read the rest at: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/03/20/brutal-new-ad-uses-trumps-own-words-against-him/