White House airs another taxpayer-funded ad: Trump speaks of the ‘final battle’

The ad shows President Donald Trump walking down a hallway, while his voice is heard saying “this is the final battle.” Among the ad’s lines: “We will cast out the communist, Marxists, and fascists. We will throw off the sick political class that hates our country. We will rout the fake news media, and we will liberate America from these villains once and for all” — an echo of his Veterans Day 2023 speech, as CNN reports.

The White House compares these ads to public-service announcements of previous administrations — such as those for Medicare, Obamacare or the anti-Covid vaccine — and says they “very clearly are not campaign ads.” The spot is nearly identical to most of a video Trump posted on Truth Social in January 2024 during his third presidential campaign; that version had six extra seconds with the campaign logo and a text number, while the White House ad ends with the caption “Paid for by the US Government.”

It is the third publicly funded ad spotted in recent days by the media tracker AdImpact: the first, which began airing Wednesday, features footage of Trump with audio denouncing communism and socialism, with on-screen text praising administration achievements such as “reigniting American manufacturing”; the second shows Trump at Mount Rushmore with the words “Never before has any nation celebrated so magnificent a triumph as this one.”

The White House gave no details on how the first ad was financed, but defended it as “public service announcements” promoting national pride. A spokesperson said: “The ad is educational and unapologetically patriotic. We should be proud of our country.” On the other hand, the watchdog group Common Cause suggested it could violate rules against using taxpayer money for “propaganda.” Carol Evans, vice president for policy at Common Cause, told CNN: “I don’t think you have to be a legal scholar and wonder why the president has to use taxpayer funds to promote his image” this close to the elections.