Biden campaign cuts a digital ad using Trump’s ‘bloodbath’ remarks
The ad cuts Trump’s quote with incendiary comments the former president has made.
The Biden campaign launched a new digital ad on Monday that leans into Donald Trump’s “bloodbath” remarks over the weekend with a montage of the former president’s past incendiary rhetoric.
The campaign is considering putting money behind the ad, a Biden campaign official told POLITICO, but it first launched the video on President Joe Biden’s account on X.
The new ad, shared first with POLITICO, cuts to a scene from when far-right and white supremacist protesters descended on Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017, and it comes after a weekend of outrage over the remarks. The Trump campaign and Republicans have slammed the media as taking his remarks out of context, while the Biden campaign and Democrats warned that the remarks were another example of Trump threatening political violence.
During Trump’s rally in Dayton, Ohio, while speaking about the auto industry, Trump said it would be a “bloodbath for the country” if he isn’t elected in November.
“That’s going to be the least of it,” Trump said, then returning to telling the crowd that China would not be able to sell any vehicles imported into the U.S. if he wins reelection.
Coverage of the remarks immediately spurred blowback for the former president, who has continued to employ increasingly heightened rhetoric as he paints a dark picture of the country under a second Biden term. His campaign slammed the media coverage as misleading, noting that Trump was talking about the auto industry and the economy during that part of the speech.
“The Fake News made a big deal out of the word ‘Bloodbath,’ knowing that it was about our shrinking auto manufacturing business, and the fact that they use the same name all the time. They are sooo bad!” Trump said in a Truth Social post on Monday.
After the ad posted, Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung sent a statement to POLITICO: “No amount of gaslighting from the Biden campaign can mask Biden’s Bloodbath he has brought all across America — from the disastrous Afghanistan withdrawal costing American lives, record number of illegals crossing the border to kill Americans, making America less safe with feckless foreign policy, and allowing rampant crime to explode in cities.”
The Biden campaign’s new ad starts with the “bloodbath” clip from Saturday, then includes Trump’s comments from after the Charlottesville rally.
“You also had people that were very fine people on both sides,” Trump said in the clip from the ad.
The video also plays Trump’s “Stand back and stand by” comments about the Proud Boys, and a later interview in which he says he’ll pardon those facing charges related to Jan. 6. The video ends with Trump saying, “It’s going to be a bloodbath,” before casting a message that says “STOP TRUMP.”
“The Trump campaign can try to spin all they want, but the context is clear: their candidate has spent every moment since his first campaign encouraging and excusing political violence. Repeatedly. It’s not a bug, it’s a feature of Donald Trump’s extremism. We take Trump at his word — and voters will too,” said Biden campaign spokesperson Sarafina Chitika.