Today’s voters have become accustomed to political advertising that seems to know no bounds, such as Ohio Republican gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy’s incendiary ad that used her opponent’s estranged mother to campaign against her. But 50 years ago, a presidential campaign finally scrapped an over-the-top ad that referenced the assassination of John F. Kennedy.
In 1976, as the country emerged from a violent political era that included a series of assassinations, President Gerald Fordof The campaign media consultant tried to remind people of that in a provocative 4.5-minute TV ad. The ad proved so disturbing to the Secret Service, Ford’s campaign manager and a focus group that it was never aired.
Ads you can watch herethe campaign began in innocuous fashion with the cheesy, ’70s-style song “I Feel Good About America.” The music, overlaid with footage of marching bands and hits from the fast-moving electorate, describes how the country has weathered the storm. “He restored the confidence of the American people,” one man said in a typical comment. The ad did not specifically mention Watergate, the Vietnam War, or political assassinations, but it was clearly expressing President Ford’s view of helping America move beyond these traumas.
Essentially, the message was that a vote for Ford was a vote to “Make America Great Again.”
We then see Ford greeting Americans on various occasions before the scene cuts to a rally at the University of Michigan.
“There yes America is changing,” the narrator says. “How long has it been since we saw this change on college campuses?
Then the ad took a dark turn. As Ford spoke, explosions sounded and the president visibly flinched. Given a pair assassination attempt It would have been understandable for him the year before if he had gone into hiding. Instead, he continued his remarks, telling the crowd, “Trust has to be earned.”
The loud noise turned out not to be gunshots, but firecrackers. It was at this point that Ford’s ad makers went overboard with their tactics.
“Neither the cherry bombs of misguided pranksters nor all the memories of recent years can separate the people from their president,” the narrator says, as the scene shifts to Ford in Dallas, waving from the convertible top of his limousine. “America changed when a limousine could be paraded openly through the streets of Dallas.”
Bailey Deardourff & Associates, the Ford campaign’s media consulting firm, commissioned the TV ad as a way to turn the president’s trailing race against Jimmy Carter around.
“We had an opportunity to create a five-minute ad that emotionally rings in all the wake-up calls of the past 12 years,” the company’s co-founder Doug Bailey said in a statement. 2009 Oral History Interviews with the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library. “About assassinations, wars, Watergate, and emotionally reinforcing what people went through. To put them through that again and shock them in a way that makes them rethink how they’re going to vote.”
It did shake people up — including campaign manager James Baker — but not in the way Bailey had hoped.
“I showed it to people on the campaign trail and they went crazy,” Bailey recalled. “First of all, the Secret Service just had a nightmare, and I respect that, I mean, in their mind, it was an invitation for a lunatic to come forward. But Jim Baker in particular, on the campaign trail, thought it was a lunatic, and it’s definitely weird that I have a screw loose.”
Bailey said Baker understood what he wanted to do, but he believed Ford would lose Texas if the ad ran.
“Okay, forgive me, but aren’t we going to lose Texas?” Bailey asked him.
“John Connally told me we were going to win Texas,” Baker replied, referring to the former Texas governor. “But you can’t mention Dallas in this way without losing Texas.”
(Carter eventually defeated Ford in Texas and became the last Democratic presidential candidate to win the state.)
Ford pollster Bob Teeter told author Jules Witkover that the ad was “shocking” to focus group members who viewed it. “It’s so emotional… it’s terrible.”
But Bailey doesn’t think this will be a deal killer.
“My reaction to that was, ‘Yeah, so they hate this ad. So what’s the next conclusion?'” Bailey said. “The whole theory of the ad is that of course they’re not going to like it. That’s why it’s designed to shock them.”
Carter won the election by two points. Bailey honored Helped Ford nearly eliminate a 20-point disadvantage in the polls and established a daily briefing hotline in 1987. He died in 2013.
Teeter had another reason for objecting to the ad, fearing that the Michigan scene would turn off Ohio voters. This fierce competition still affects politics today.
A few weeks ago, Michigan Senate candidate Abdul-Sayed responded to Vice President J.D. Vance calling him a weasel. “I said, ‘No, no, no, you’re talking about f**king Wolverine,'” El-Sayed addresses the cheering crowdciting the name of the University of Michigan team. “You can take your Buckeyes somewhere else!” he added, referring to Ohio State’s nickname.
Bailey recalled a similar situation 50 years ago.
“Now, as you know as well as anyone, there is no greater athletic rivalry than between Ohio State and Michigan,” Bailey recalled in the oral history. “Now, I’m an Ohioan, Teeter isn’t — he’s a Wolverine — and he’s not only from Michigan, he’s from Ann Arbor. So his point is, it’s going to cost us Ohio State. If you show all the UM students in the ads and Ford speaking at UM, you’re going to lose Ohio State.”
Regardless, Ford lost Ohio.
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Frederic J. Frommer, a sports and political historian who has written for The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Atlantic and other national publications, is writing a book, That’s Right! How Money and Chaos Revolutionized Baseball” ‘1970s. “
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