Biden ad attacks 'convicted criminal' Trump in $50M paid media blitz

WASHINGTON ― President Joe Biden's reelection campaign is escalating attacks against Donald Trump over the former president's recent guilty verdict and other legal troubles, launching a new television ad Monday as part of a massive $50 million paid media campaign that slams Trump as a "convicted criminal."

The 30-second spot, which will air in battleground states and on national cable television, marks the Biden campaign's first ad that tries to seize on Trump's guilty conviction on 34 felony counts in his New York criminal hush-money trial last month.

"In the courtroom, we see Donald Trump for who he is: He's been convicted of 34 felonies, found liable for sexual assault, and he committed financial fraud," a narrator says in the ad, which shows clips of Trump in court. "Meanwhile, Joe Biden's been working."

The ad touts Biden's efforts to lower health care costs and "making big corporations pay their fair share.

"This election is between a convicted criminal who's only out for himself and a president who's fighting for your family," the ad concludes.

The ad's rollout comes 10 days before the first presidential debate of the 2024 campaign, set for June 27 on CNN.

By hitting Trump over his conviction, the Biden campaign risks further inviting attacks from Republican critics who argue Trump's prosecution was motivated by politics and the 2024 election.

"Crooked Joe Biden and the Democrats' weaponized the justice system against President Trump and this new ad once again proves the sham trial was always meant to be election interference, but Americans see through it," Trump campaign spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said in a statement.

"The contrast between President Trump’s strength and success versus Crooked Joe Biden’s weakness, failures, and dishonesty will be made clear on the debate stage next week," she said.

The ad shows the Biden campaign plans to remind Americans of Trump's guilty conviction even after Biden's son, Hunter Biden, was found guilty on three felony gun counts last week.

"Trump approaches the first debate as a convicted felon who continues to prove that he will do anything and harm anyone if it means more power and vengeance for Donald Trump," Biden campaign communications director Michael Tyler said in a statement.

Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee, was convicted last month of falsifying business records to hide a hush-money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 presidential election. His sentencing date is July 11.

Trump in January was ordered by a Manhattan jury to pay advice columnist E. Jean Carroll $83.3 million for defaming her in 2019, when he denied her allegations of sexual assault.

The Trump Organization, Trump's real estate company, was found guilty in 2022 of tax fraud and other crimes. A New York judge in February ordered Trump to pay a fine of $453.5 million, with additional penalties against two of his sons, for fraudulently over-valuing his real estate empire.

“Character matters," Tyler said. "And the president of the United States should be someone who understands that the highest office in the land is about you and your family — not a vehicle to enrich yourself. That is the ethos Joe Biden puts into the job every day."

Reach Joey Garrison on X @joeygarrison.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Biden ad attacks Trump as 'convicted criminal' in $50M media campaign