G.O.P. ‘Super PAC’ Weighs Hard-Line Attack on Obama
By JEFF ZELENY and JIM RUTENBERG
Published: May 17, 2012 808 Comments
WASHINGTON — A group of high-profile Republican strategists is working
with a conservative billionaire on a proposal to mount one of the most
provocative campaigns of the “super PAC” era and attack President Obama in ways that Republicans have so far shied away from.
Timed to upend the Democratic National Convention in September, the plan
would “do exactly what John McCain would not let us do,” the
strategists wrote.
The plan,
which is awaiting approval, calls for running commercials linking Mr.
Obama to incendiary comments by his former spiritual adviser, the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., whose race-related sermons made him a highly charged figure in the 2008 campaign.
“The world is about to see Jeremiah Wright and understand his influence on Barack Obama
for the first time in a big, attention-arresting way,” says the
proposal, which was overseen by Fred Davis and commissioned by Joe
Ricketts, the founder of the brokerage firm TD Ameritrade. Mr. Ricketts
is increasingly putting his fortune to work in conservative politics.
The $10 million plan, one of several being studied by Mr. Ricketts,
includes preparations for how to respond to the charges of race-baiting
it envisions if it highlights Mr. Obama’s former ties to Mr. Wright, who
espouses what is known as “black liberation theology.”
The group suggested hiring as a spokesman an “extremely literate
conservative African-American” who can argue that Mr. Obama misled the
nation by presenting himself as what the proposal calls a “metrosexual,
black Abe Lincoln.”
A copy of a detailed advertising plan was obtained by The New York Times
through a person not connected to the proposal who was alarmed by its
tone. It is titled “The Defeat of Barack Hussein Obama: The Ricketts
Plan to End His Spending for Good.”
The proposal was presented last week in Chicago to associates and family
members of Mr. Ricketts, who is also the patriarch of the family that
owns the Chicago Cubs.
Brian Baker, president and general counsel of a super PAC called the
Ending Spending Action Fund, said Mr. Ricketts had studied several
advertising proposals in recent months and had not signed off on a
specific approach to taking on Mr. Obama.
“Joe Ricketts is prepared to spend significant resources in the 2012
election in both the presidential race and Congressional races,” Mr.
Baker said in an interview Wednesday. “He is very concerned about the
future direction of the country and plans to take a stand.”
The document makes clear that the effort is only in the planning stages
and awaiting full approval from Mr. Ricketts. People involved in the
planning said the publicity now certain to surround it could send the
strategists back to the drawing board.
But it serves as a rare, detailed look at the birth of the sort of
political sneak attack that has traditionally been hatched in the
shadows and has become a staple of presidential politics.
It also shows how a single individual can create his own movement and
spend unlimited sums to have major influence on a presidential election
in a campaign finance environment in which groups operating
independently of candidates are flourishing.
Should the plan proceed, it would run counter to the strategy being
employed by Mitt Romney’s team, which has so far avoided such attacks.
The Romney campaign has sought to focus attention on the economy, and
has concluded that personal attacks on Mr. Obama, who is still well
liked personally by most independent voters surveyed for polls, could
backfire.
Mr. Ricketts has become an increasingly active player in Republican
politics through several political action committees, including Ending
Spending. He has a son, Pete, who is a member of the Republican National
Committee from Nebraska and a daughter, Laura, who is a top contributor
to Mr. Obama’s re-election campaign. She has not been involved in her
father’s political efforts.
The 54-page proposal was professionally bound and illustrated with color
photographs, indicating that it is far beyond a mere discussion. The
strategists have already contacted Larry Elder, a black conservative
radio host in Los Angeles, about serving as a spokesman, and the plan
calls for a group of black business leaders to endorse the effort. The
strategists have also registered a domain name, Character Matters. (my emphasis -- LOL!!! -- Scott)
The proposal suggests that Mr. Ricketts believes the 2008 campaign of
Senator John McCain erred in not using images of Mr. Wright against Mr.
Obama, who has said that the pastor helped him find Jesus but that he
was never present for Mr. Wright’s politically charged sermons. Mr.
Obama left the church during the campaign.
Apparently referring to a Wright ad that was produced for the McCain
campaign by Mr. Davis’s firm but never used, the proposal opens with a
quote from Mr. Ricketts: “If the nation had seen that ad, they’d never
have elected Barack Obama.”
The planning document is emblazoned with the logo of Strategic
Perception, the political advertising firm of Mr. Davis, the colorful
Republican operative who last worked on the Republican presidential
campaign of former Gov. Jon M. Huntsman of Utah. Included on his
“Recommended Team of Pirates” are the former Huntsman pollster Whit
Ayres and the McCain campaign Internet strategist Becki Donatelli.
The document, which was written by former advisers to Mr. McCain, is
critical of his decision in 2008 not to aggressively pursue Mr. Obama’s
relationship with Mr. Wright. In the opening paragraphs of the proposal,
the Republican strategists refer to Mr. McCain as “a crusty old
politician who often seemed confused, burdened with a campaign just as
confused.”
“Our plan is to do exactly what John McCain would not let us do: Show
the world how Barack Obama’s opinions of America and the world were
formed,” the proposal says. “And why the influence of that misguided
mentor and our president’s formative years among left-wing intellectuals
has brought our country to its knees.”
The plan is designed for maximum impact, far beyond a typical $10
million television advertising campaign. It calls for full-page
newspaper advertisements featuring a comment Mr. Wright made the Sunday
after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. “America’s chickens are coming home
to roost,” he said.
The plan is for the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, N.C.,
to be “jolted.” The advertising campaign would include television ads,
outdoor advertisements and huge aerial banners flying over the
convention site for four hours one afternoon.
The strategists grappled with the quandary of running against Mr. Obama
that other Republicans have cited this year: “How to inflame their
questions on his character and competency, while allowing themselves to
still somewhat ‘like’ the man becomes the challenge.”
Lamenting that voters “still aren’t ready to hate this president,” the
document concludes that the campaign should “explain how forces out of
Obama’s control, that shaped the man, have made him completely the wrong
choice as president in these days and times.”
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