Wesleyan Media Project: Obama’s Swing State Ad Blitz

ABC News‘s Jake Tapper and Devin Dwyer report on data released by The Wesleyan Media Project showing that the Obama campaign ran more than 5,000 ads over just six days in key swing states. The early, intense buy is highly unusual for an incumbent President and consisted mostly of ads aimed at defending the president’s energy record after it was attacked in ads by right-leaning PACs that were run in many of the same markets.

“I can’t remember a time when so many groups were so involved in general election advertising so early,” noted Erika Franklin Fowler assistant professor of government at Wesleyan University and director of the Wesleyan Media Project. “An underappreciated fact about this year’s contest is that outside groups are spending more money per ad than candidates, which makes examining the balance of actual ads voters are seeing very crucial when attempting to tease out their influence.”

ABC also has links to the ads and fact-checks the Obama and PAC ads here, showing mixed results for the veracity of both.