Women Vote! — a political arm of EMILY’s List — has bought more than $237,400 worth of television advertisements in Hawaii for U.S. Rep. Colleen Hanabusa, which will help the congresswoman offset the imbalance in ads backing U.S. Sen. Brian Schatz in the Democratic primary for Senate.
The EMILY’s List ad praises Hanabusa for fighting Republican attempts to cut Social Security and Medicare, defending women’s access to affordable health care and pushing for equal pay for women.
EMILY’s List, a national group that supports Democratic women who favor abortion rights, had previously spent $54,850 on mailers for Hanabusa. The group has endorsed the congresswoman.
Schatz, who holds a significant fundraising advantage over Hanabusa, has had a considerable presence on TV in the weeks leading up to the vote. Last week the League of Conservation Voters, which has endorsed Schatz, purchased ads in the islands on behalf of the senator.
The national group had initially said the ad buy was about $380,000, but federal independent expenditure reports show that ads were about $365,400 and that the group also spent $32,800 on polling.
Other national interest groups, such as MoveOn.org, are also independently helping the senator’s campaign.
The mention of Hanabusa’s defense of Social Security and Medicare in the EMILY’s List ad is a counterpunch to claims by the Schatz campaign, the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare and progressive groups that the senator is stronger than the congresswoman on Social Security.
Over the weekend, U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., sent out a fundraising appeal for Schatz to members of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee nationally that recognized Schatz’s support for expanding Social Security benefits.
