Donald Trump will not be on any ballots in midterm elections this fall, but you wouldn’t know it by the wave of campaign-like ads produced by the White House on taxpayers’ dime.
Trump told voters last month to “pretend I’m on the ballot.” His former White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News viewers to “vote like President Trump is on the ballot.” House Speaker Mike Johnson told supporters that Trump’s “legacy” will be on ballots — even if Trump’s name isn’t.
Facing low approval ratings and a grim forecast for Republicans trying to retain control of Congress, the president has turned to the airwaves.
At least three television ads in recent days echo Trump’s campaign messages promising to take down “the deep state” and “fake news,” or promote himself and his work in office with the song “Love Me” by singer-songwriter JMSN. Each of them ends with the caption “Paid for by the U.S. Government.”
“Every taxpayer, no matter your party, should be outraged by this,” Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy wrote. “Your money is being used to fund campaign ads for Trump. It’s totally completely [illegal]. He’s stealing your money for his campaign.”
It’s unclear just how much the Trump administration is spending on the ads, which have aired on Fox News and CBS as well as during NBC’s Saturday Night Live and several college and NFL football games. But the costs are likely to have exceeded $1 million, according to an AdImpact.
“This is an unlawful and outrageous misuse of public funds,” former White House ethics lawyer and Democracy Defenders Action co-founder Norm Eisen told The Independent.
“Federal law forbids using taxpayer dollars for political propaganda, which this clearly is,” he said. “This is yet another corrupt attempt to advance a partisan agenda ahead of the midterm election, paid for by average American taxpayers who are already suffering from high costs caused by this administration’s failed policies.”
On September 24, a group of congressional Democrats serving on appropriations and finance committees pushed the White House to “immediately take this ad off the air” and “discipline” any federal employees involved.
“No taxpayer funding should be used to air this outrageous propaganda,” they wrote. “The law is not complicated. You cannot use taxpayer dollars for political advertisements.”
That same day, Sen. Maggie Hassan, a top Democrat on the Joint Economic Committee, asked the White House to detail the costs of the ad and where the money was pulled from, as well as any outside contractors, federal agencies and government employees who were involved.
But by the weekend, the White House was pushing out at least two more.
On Sunday, the administration ran yet another ad, titled “Final Battle,” invoking imagery and remarks from a video that appeared on his Truth Social account in 2024.
In a voice-over, Trump promises to expel “the warmongers,” “globalists” and “deep state” actors from the government to “rout the fake news media” and “liberate America from these villains once and for all.”
The ad, like the others, ends with “Paid for by the U.S. Government.”
Public Citizen, a nonprofit consumer advocacy group, has filed a complaint with the federal government accusing the White House of violating the Hatch Act, among other laws.
The Hatch Act prohibits federal employees from engaging in most political activity. The president is largely exempt from the law, but government employees and administration officials who worked on the ads could be in the crosshairs, according to legal experts.
Public Citizen’s complaint, sent to the Government Accountability Office and the Office of Special Counsel on September 25, says that “the focus is on Trump’s campaign rhetoric and images and voiceovers promoting the character of Donald Trump.”
“This ad appears to be simple propaganda devoid of a useful government function designed to influence the upcoming elections in violation of these laws,” according t the complaint.
“This administration’s repeated and flagrant violations of the law, including the Hatch Act, are an affront to taxpayers and our democracy,” added Craig Holman, a government ethics expert with Public Citizen, which has filed a dozen ethics complaints against the Trump administration over the last year, none of which have been answered.
“That negligence is dangerous, and creates conditions that allow for the situation we are responding to today,” he said.
Last year, members of Congress demanded Hatch Act investigations after government websites included messages blaming Democrats for a government shutdown.
The administration didn’t respond until last week, nearly one year later after the House Oversight Committee filed a complaint. The Office of Special Counsel said further investigations or disciplinary actions were not warranted.
“The government works for the American people, period, not to weaponize agencies for partisan propaganda campaigns,” said Rep. Robert Garcia, the top Democrat on the committee, said in response.
Rep. Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, said Trump’s latest ads likely constitute “felony criminal theft and conversion of government property for political campaign purposes.”
“It is a Hatch Act violation for any government employees who worked on it or used government resources to make it,” he wrote.
The White House has defended the campaign, which it calls “public service announcements.”
“The announcements are very clearly not campaign ads; President Trump is not on the ballot and there is no call to action,” the White House said in a press release last week. “Instead, the announcements are a reminder for Americans to love their country and know why it’s worth defending — at home, at the border, and abroad.”
Before she was demoted to a role as a “special envoy,” now-former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem faced a bipartisan grilling over her agency’s $220 million ad spending blitz, and was unable to explain how a company connected to her own spokesperson landed a lucrative, no-bid government contracts.
Trump fired Noem one day after she testified to lawmakers about the campaign.
Republican Sen. John Kennedy called Noem’s ads “master-class dumb.”
“I don’t think any public official, including President Trump or Kristi Noem or John Kennedy, should spend public money on private ads for themselves,” he told CBS Face the Nation on Sunday.
MS NOW’s Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough unloaded on Republicans Monday morning for supporting “the behemoth centralized state, big government” and “stealing taxpayer dollars to run a political advertisement.”
“Why are you allowing the centralized state to seize money from your tax-paying constituents to run a political ad filled with lies?” Scarborough asked.
“Never take another Republican seriously when they pretend they care about ‘waste, fraud and abuse,’” Senator Murphy wrote. “What a cult this party has become.”
