DCCC targets 14 for Independence Day campaign

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) will fund an Independence Day advertising and grassroots blitz next week in 14 districts currently held by Republicans, the committee announced yesterday.

Beginning Monday, the DCCC will run radio ads slamming GOPers for voting against a $1,500 bonus for troops and against increasing disability and retirement benefits for veterans. It will also send e-mails to 2 million voters, place more than 50,000 phone calls, launch a veterans-focused webpage, and run Web ads. It is not releasing the cost of the campaign.

{mosads}“Their constituents deserve to know that the Republican record on veterans is all talk and no action,” said DCCC Chairman Chris Van Hollen (Md.).

A spokeswoman for the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) said the campaign distorts the targeted incumbents’ records of supporting veterans and pointed out that two Democrats opposed the troop bonuses.

The troop bonuses would have transferred money from elsewhere in an Iraq war supplemental bill passed in 2003. The benefits vote was a motion to recommit a conference report with instructions to maximize the number of veterans who are eligible to receive full retirement and disability benefits concurrently.

“Without a single accomplishment to tout this Independence Day and an abysmal approval rating, the majority party is clearly lashing out,” NRCC spokeswoman Julie Shutley said. “Does the DCCC plan to run the same ads against [Rep.] John
Murtha (D-Pa.), who voted the exact same way [on the bonuses]?”

Ads will run against Reps. Shelley Moore Capito (W.Va.), Sam Graves (Mo.), Robin Hayes (N.C.), Joe Knollenberg (Mich.), Jon Porter (Nev.), James Walsh (N.Y.) and Don Young (Alaska). Phone calls and Web ads will target Reps. Thelma Drake (Va.), Mark Kirk (Ill.), Randy Kuhl (N.Y.), Marilyn Musgrave (Colo.) and Heather Wilson (N.M.). The committee will run only Web ads against Reps. Phil English (Pa.) and Mike Ferguson (N.J.).