Former Central Intelligence Director Michael Hayden in a new ad slammed Donald Trump over allegations the former president mishandled classified documents that led to a 37-count federal indictment, Bloomberg News reports.
Hayden said Trump “must face consequences” in the ad, which, according to the report, demonstrates the extent to which the former president’s legal troubles figure to play a key role in the 2024 campaign.
The one-minute ad, which was funded by the Republican Accountability Project, will start running Monday in three battleground states, the report said.
“We don’t know who saw them, but we have to assume those documents were compromised,” Hayden says in the ad.
The Republican Accountability Project is among three major outside groups made up mostly of current and former Republicans that are seeking to undermine the 2024 frontrunner’s grip on the GOP. The Lincoln Project and Defending Democracy Together are the others.
Hayden is a political independent who has served under presidents of both parties, but the retired four-star general put aside his political differences with Democrats in 2020 to back Joe Biden’s candidacy, saying at the time that “Biden is a good man. Donald Trump is not.”
The Republican Accountability Project has already spent $422,000 on the ad, which will purportedly run in Georgia, Arizona and Wisconsin.
Bloomberg’s Gregory Korte writes that, “It’s the latest salvo in what they say is a $2 million campaign focusing on Trump’s indictments and running primarily on Fox News and CNN.”
