The National Rifle Association opened its 2024 political efforts on Tuesday with a huge ad buy to take out Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT), who is facing his toughest challenger yet , decorated former SEAL Tim Sheehy .
Featuring a “real mom,” the group’s first ad of the political season broadly charges that Tester has failed to stand up for those who have guns for self-protection, which studies have shown is the No. 1 reason people are on a million-gun-a-month buying binge.
In the 30-second ad slated for Montana stations and shared with Secrets on Tuesday, the “mom” said she can’t wait for the police to respond to a call for help, and that’s why she needs her self-defense weapon.
“Where I live, you can't wait for 911. My family’s safety is in my hands alone. But gun grabbers who've never been to Montana, let alone out here, want to take my rights away. My gun is in my pocket, but my senator is in theirs. Jon Tester failed to protect my right to self-defense, and that's why moms like me can't wait to fire him in November,” she says while pumping a shell into her shotgun.
The NRA is expected to spend $2 million in its anti-Tester “Can’t Wait” ad campaign, a sizable amount for the group. The NRA prides itself on rallying its supporters for its causes and politicians rather than spending heavily on ads.
In the Montana race, the NRA and other outside groups see potential for a GOP pickup in Sheehy, a businessman. In a recent poll, the Republican is leading the three-term Tester by 8 points. Sheehy is endorsed by former President Donald Trump, whom the NRA backs.
“Tim Sheehy represents what’s best about the USA. As a patriot, decorated combat SEAL, and entrepreneur, Tim embodies exceptionalism in everything he does. Tim has an ‘A’ rating from the National Rifle Association and will protect the Second Amendment rights of the residents of Montana,” Doug Hamlin , the newly installed CEO and executive vice president, told Secrets exclusively.
“The balance of power in the U.S. Senate is on the line in Montana, and the National Rifle Association is all in to elect Tim Sheehy,” he added.
Randy Kozuch, the chairman of the NRA Political Victory Fund, said that protecting the Second Amendment requires winning control of the Senate, especially given that Vice President Kamala Harris has vowed to ban guns and require confiscations and buybacks.
“This November, gun owners can't afford to sit on the sidelines. The NRA is mobilizing considerable resources to support strong pro-Second Amendment candidates for Congress and the White House to ensure that Americans will be able to continue to exercise their right to keep and bear arms,” he told us.
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“With this seven-figure ad buy, only a portion of our electoral engagement in Montana, we are calling out Jon Tester. Though Tester likes to portray himself as a friend of gun owners, his voting record in the Senate makes clear he is not on the side of Montanans who support the Second Amendment. Tester has voted for Obama and Biden's anti-gun Supreme Court justices and against pro-freedom justices. He has voted to spend taxpayer dollars to promote state-level red flag laws, which are ripe for abuse, and deny gun owners basic due process protections. And he's voted multiple times to criminalize private firearms transfers while supporting government blacklists. To return a pro-gun majority to the United States Senate, Montanans should hand Jon Tester his walking papers and elect Tim Sheehy in November,” Kozuch said.
While Tester doesn’t make a big deal about guns on his campaign website, he vows a commitment to the Second Amendment on his Senate webpage . On that, he said, “As a gun owner, Jon is a strong supporter of the Second Amendment. He has supported bipartisan legislation to keep guns out of the hands of criminals, terrorists, and those found by a judge to be a danger to themselves or others. He believes that we can keep our kids and communities safe without infringing on the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding gun owners. That is why he has also consistently voted against any type of database or registry of gun owners, opposed legislation that would prevent an individual from purchasing or possessing firearms without meaningful due process, and broken with his own party to oppose banning assault weapons.”
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