'Dogs won't eat the dog food': Ex-GOP operative warns Trump war chest won't save his party
President Donald Trump is heading into the midterms with ruthless fundraising and a huge war chest, both in his own committees and in the super PACs supporting him, that he can use to protect vulnerable Republicans from whatever onslaught is coming their way. But there's a big problem standing in the way, former GOP strategist Tim Miller told MS NOW's Nicolle Wallace on Wednesday's edition of "Deadline: White House."
"Tim, I know there's a lot of sort of political press around the mega-money machine, but you have to be able to deploy the money competently and strategically," said Wallace. "And I wonder what you make of the money situation right now."
"Yeah, two thoughts on this," said Miller, a frequent critic of the administration. "One, the Republicans are going to have more money this midterm, I think, for the first time in a decade or two ... but the Democrats have actually been better at fundraising since Obama. And so that is something the Democrats are going to have to contend with."
"Donald Trump, if you go back to last year, what was he doing this time last year? Shaking people down, like shaking down CEOs, shaking down the richest people in the world. They were funding his ballroom ... he's still doing that," said Miller. "When he first came in, he was super effective at getting rich people to, you know, do favors for them in exchange for getting a bag for his super PAC. So they're going to have a ton of money."
"Here's the problem, though: like advertising, you need to be able to have something to sell," said Miller. "You know, if the dogs won't eat the dog food — it's the old phrase in advertising — it doesn't do you any good. And right now, if people are experiencing real pain economically, and if people are looking at them and thinking, this guy, you know, doesn't have his eye on the ball at all, and I don't feel like my concerns or grievances or needs are being met. They can run all the ads they want and it's not going to work."
"So what they can do is go into these red districts," said Miller. "Some of those states I was talking about in the last segment, you know, and save ground, right, going to Iowa and, and, you know, smear the Democratic candidate and try to get their number down with Republican voters and they'll probably be able to use their money to do that relatively effectively. And that's what Democrats have to combat."
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