WASHINGTON — Democrats are launching an ad campaign targeting seniors to highlight Sen. Rick Scott‘s push to have Congress to reauthorize legislation every five years.
The proposal in the 11-point plan from Scott, a Florida Republican and chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, is the focus of Facebook ads funded by the Democratic National Committee aimed at seniors in Senate battleground states. The ads feature questions from a Fox News Channel anchor about whether Scott’s plan would “sunset” Social Security and Medicare, or require Congress to vote periodically to keep the programs running.
“Seniors across America depend on the Medicare and Social Security benefits they’ve been paying into for decades to access life-saving care and cover everyday expenses — and Republicans are putting their right to these hard-earned benefits in jeopardy,” Brooke Goren, the DNC’s states communications director, said in a statement.
The Scott proposal would require programs enacted through federal legislation to be voted on every five years.
Rodell Mollineau, a Democratic strategist and partner at the bipartisan firm Rokk Solutions, said as others have that Scott has given a “gift” to Democrats by allowing them to paint his ideas as being more broadly representative of what Republicans would do in power.
“Nobody has been stupid enough to say them out loud, let alone put them in a plan and put it on a website,” Mollineau said, adding that it “helps kind of delineate the choices in a 2022 election.”
He also said that Democrats will be smart to elevate the “kitchen table issues” rather than Scott’s social policy proposals.
Far from backing down, Scott — a potential Republican candidate for the White House in 2024 — is launching his own television ads starting Friday that feature President Joe Biden and White House press secretary Jen Psaki amplifying his proposal.
“I’ve got a plan to rescue our country. Washington hates it. That’s how you know it’s good,” Scott says in a direct-to-camera appeal before giving the website address for reviewing his proposals.
The narrator in the Scott ad says, “Rick Scott’s Rescue America plan has gotten under Joe Biden’s skin.”
Biden in recent days has made repeated references to “extreme” plans of “MAGA” Republicans, using the acronym for former President Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” slogan in an attempt to recast the election as a choice between two parties’ plans instead of a referendum on Democrats’ record in power.
Biden focused on the Scott plan during an inflation-themed speech Tuesday, suggesting that imposing new limits on entitlement programs could lead to future legislative hostage-taking.
“Really, ask yourself: How well are we going to sleep at night knowing that every five years, MAGA Republicans, if they’re still the Republican — as I said, this is not your father’s Republican Party — if we’re going to have to vote on whether you will have Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, and what amounts you’ll have in each of those programs?” Biden said.
