In key US states, voters are being inundated with political ads

Photo: Brendan Smialowski Agence France-Presse Kamala Harris, during a speech given Wednesday in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

Gregory Walton – Agence France-Presse in New York

Published at 8:34 a.m.

• United States

Twenty-two commercials in three hours! The screens of millions of Americans living in key states for the presidential election are being flooded with political ads, much to the chagrin of viewers.

Eight pro-Harris or anti-Trump ads, six anti-Harris or pro-Trump ads, and another eight devoted to local elections: that’s the tally for an evening on NBC’s local channel for Philadelphia and its surroundings, in the state of Pennsylvania, a few days before an extraordinarily close election.

Pennsylvania is particularly targeted by this avalanche of advertising, because it is one of the seven most contested states that will decide the election.

The succession of ads is sometimes dizzying, switching without transition from one damning message for Kamala Harris to another, singing her praises.

“I started yelling at my TV to stop playing the same political ads over and over,” wrote one author, Aimée Davis, on the social network X.

For blogger Brad Warthen, “they're depressing.” “I love watching baseball, but I could do without the ads,” he said.

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Like billboards, newspaper ads, and targeted online campaigns, TV ads remain a central part of candidates' strategies.

According to Emarketer, by the end of the 2024 election, $12.32 billion will have been spent on political advertising, compared to $9.57 billion in 2020. And $7 billion of that spending will be on TV ads, a 7.5% increase from 2020.

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Culture Wars

In the United States, major television networks such as NBC, ABC, CBS and Fox cover the entire country, but they also operate local branches that sell their own advertising space, allowing candidates to target specific geographic areas and demographic groups.

On NBC’s Philadelphia screen, a cinematic clip paints a dire picture of the American economy, global conflict, crime and political violence, before Donald Trump appears, walking like a savior toward the camera.

A few ads later, a pro-Harris ad features a steelworker proclaiming “Elon Musk votes for his money, I vote for mine,” an allusion to the boss of Tesla, SpaceX and X, one of Donald Trump’s biggest campaign donors.

All the polls are affected. David McCormick, the Republican candidate for the Senate in a crucial Pennsylvania district, is targeted by a pro-Democratic ad featuring health professionals to attack his positions against abortion.

His rival, Democratic Senator Bob Casey, is accused in a pro-Republican ad of being responsible for the illegal spread of fentanyl, a powerful opioid that causes tens of thousands of overdoses each year in the United States. To portray him as too progressive, another ad highlights his support for transgender rights, showing an athlete participating in a women's track and field competition referred to as a man by the voiceover.

Many similar ads, against abortion or transgender rights, have been broadcast, witness to the American “culture wars” on social issues.

“It’s dehumanizing. It takes an issue…and treats it like it’s an outrageous position,” says Parker Molloy, an author and blogger who writes about gender issues.

A crude ad from a pro-life campaign prompted local stations to explain that federal law prohibits them from “blocking or editing” any content.