TV ads still work

The communications world has changed drastically since I started in politics, but 2024 proved that TV ads still are the best way to deliver a campaign message.

Even in today’s fractured and fragmented information landscape – with cable networks, Facebook, X, TikTok, Blue Sky, podcasts and the rest – nothing carries more throw-weight than a 30-second TV ad.

Trump’s campaign proved it. While he was rambling and ranting at rallies, “dancing” onstage to YMCA and losing rally audiences, his team was running ads that made him look strong and Kamala Harris weak.

I had a bad feeling when I watched the World Series and football games and repeatedly saw ads attacking Harris – especially the one about tax-paid transgender surgeries for prison inmates, ending with the devastating line, “she’s for they/them, not you.”

That hurt Harris with men and women, young and old voters and Latinos and Blacks who are more conservative culturally than White progressives.

In North Carolina, proof of TV ads’ power came from Democrats, especially Josh Stein’s campaign.

There’s a popular line of punditry now that treats Stein’s blowout victory as the inevitable product of Mark Robinson’s weaknesses.

But that race was tied a year ago. Stein opened up a 7 or 8-point lead after he launched began his barrage of TV ads featuring Robinson himself. The porn scandal was the final blow; Robinson’s money dried up and Republicans dropped him.

The Democrats who won Council of State races – Rachel Hunt, Jeff Jackson, Mo Green and Elaine Marshall – raised enough money to run strong ads on TV. Like Stein, they didn’t hesitate to – goodness gracious! – “go negative.”

So did Congressman Don Davis and legislative candidates like Senator-elect Terence Everitt.

Supreme Court Justice Allison Riggs boldly broke with judicial-campaign tradition and ran an ad about her support for – and her opponent’s opposition to –women’s reproductive rights.

Ads worked because TV – local news, national networks and cable channels – is still the number-one way people get information. Social media has a big audience, but not as big as TV. And newspapers lag far behind.

In the wake of Trump’s win, some Democrats say we need to create an information ecosystem like the right’s.

That’s fine; go to it. Still, if you want to win, get on TV.