Americans For Prosperity Action, a conservative super PAC, is disavowing former President Donald Trump as the lead candidate for the 2024 election for president with its launch of a $1.68 million ad buy Wednesday in North Carolina, Arkansas, and Tennessee, all Super Tuesday states, urging Republican voters to vote against him in the primary.
“We appreciate him for the policies that he enacted while he was president, but we believe it’s time to turn the page and look for some new fresh voices that are going to be able to not only reverse the damage of Bidenomics but move America in a new and transformative direction,” Christine Ravold, regional communications manager for Americans For Prosperity North Carolina, told Carolina Journal in a telephone interview Thursday.
She said the super PAC spent $830,000 to run the ad in the Tar Heel State because the 2024 election is so important for the country’s future.
“We’re harnessing our resources and our grassroots to mobilize people for a really important election that we think matters because we cannot have more Bidenomics, more of Joe Biden’s policies that are hurting not only North Carolinians but also Americans across the country,” Ravold said.
She said AFP believes they are the first outside group to get involved in the Super Tuesday states because this election is so vital.
Americans For Prosperity Action is following in the footsteps of its sister political advocacy group, Americans For Prosperity, which encouraged similar action this past February.
At the time, a spokesperson for AFPA told Carolina Journal in an emailed statement that it intended to get involved in the GOP presidential primary after staying out the last two cycles and anticipated supporting and deploying its resources and unmatched grassroots network in support of a candidate other than Trump.
Comments from a memo from Emily Seidel, chief executive of the non-profit group Americans for Prosperity, which is part of the network founded by billionaire industrialist brothers Charles and the late David Koch, indicated that Trump is a part of the past.
“To write a new chapter for our country, we need to turn the page on the past,” she said. “So, the best thing for the country would be to have a president in 2025 who represents a new chapter. The American people have shown that they’re ready to move on, and so AFP will help them do that.”
The AFPA ad continues that rhetoric with a woman who says she is tired of the chaos and drama surrounding Trump, his obsession with the 2020 election, his indictments, and how none of it will help the GOP beat President Joe Biden in 2024 and that the party needs to move on.
Trump has been indicted four times in both state and federal cases, with the latest coming this month from Georgia for alleged crimes during the state’s 2020 elections. North Carolinians Mark Meadows and Sidney Powell are also among the 18 people indicted along with Trump in that case.
A recent Civitas Poll seems to concur with the super PAC’s thinking, with only 29% of likely North Carolina voters saying they would like to see Trump return to the White House for a second term, with 8% preferring another Republican to take the oath of office in 2024, and 8% wanted to see “someone from another party.”
In addition to Wednesday’s ad, AFP spent $4 million in ad buys on the night of the recent Republican debate.
Ravold said they will be endorsing other statewide federal races up and down the ballot.
“The presidential race at the top of the ticket has a lot to do with success further down the ballot, and those races are just as important,” she said.
North Carolina’s primary is on March 5.