A group backing Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) has launched what critics have described as a confusing attack ad against former President Donald Trump.
In the 31-second spot, titled “Fight Democrats, Not Republicans,” released by the pro-DeSantis super PAC Never Back Down over the weekend, the narrator urges Trump to “fight Democrats, not lie about Gov. DeSantis.”
The voice-over concludes by asking: “What happened to Donald Trump?”
Watch the video here:
Political commentators were puzzled by the spot and noted how nothing about Trump has really changed in regard to how he treats fellow Republicans.
The former president is deploying the same divisive and gaslighting tactics and rhetoric in his 2024 run for the White House as he did in his 2016 and 2020 campaigns.
The ad follows a pro-Trump PAC’s “pudding fingers” spot taunting DeSantis and Never Back Down’s retaliatory “gun-grabber” commercial aimed at Trump.
Sunday on CNN’s “Newsroom,” anchor Jim Acosta suggested the new spot looked like something Democrats would run against Trump.
Democratic strategist Maria Cardona told Acosta the ad was “completely lame.”
“It was just kind of saying, ‘Oh, please, don’t attack me. Don’t do the same thing that the meanie Democrats are doing,’ right?” she said, noting it was “devoid of substance” and of “delineating what is wrong with Trump’s policies” because “there really is no difference” between him and DeSantis.
“And that’s their problem,” she added.
Twitter users noted how Trump attacking his opponents is really nothing new: