Site Presented By
Tuesday, Nov 24, 2009
He's the father of the modern attack ad, and he's behind the Bush campaign's new wave of anti-Kerry spots. Alex Castellanos is known as vicious, irresponsible -- and effective.
Mar 15, 2004 | The Bush campaign launched its first negative attack ad on television late last week, earlier than in any presidential race in history. For an incumbent president to abandon the elevated surroundings of his White House Rose Garden so speedily reveals anxiety about an opponent ahead of or tied with him in the polls. Bush's 30-second spot portrays Sen. John Kerry as "wrong on taxes, wrong on defense." It claims that he would raise taxes by $900 billion. (A Kerry spokesperson says the $900 billion number was "made up"; Kerry's plan is to rescind Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy.) Then the ad paints Kerry as weak on terrorism.
The Bush strategy is to unleash the heaviest round of negative TV ads ever in order to discredit Kerry before he can solidify his lead. Sitting on an unprecedented mountain of money, the Bush team is blanketing 17 swing states between now and the GOP convention in late August.
Two weeks ago the first warm, biographical ads touting Bush's leadership were unveiled. But even those carried a surprisingly divisive edge, using images of 9/11 -- even a recovered body, which some victims' families and firefighters found tasteless and exploitative.
Now, as the Republicans enter attack mode, it's prime time for Alex Castellanos -- the charismatic, controversial and confrontational Republican media consultant. Castellanos is the party's ultimate hit man, hired by the Bush-Cheney campaign to put his stamp on the contest.
"Republicans have sent every signal that this is going to be a vicious campaign against John Kerry," says Democratic media consultant Rich Davis. "And Alex has a well-earned reputation for producing searing, negative ads."
"If I were John Kerry, I'd go get a catcher's cup and an asbestos suit, because I think they're going to come after him with everything but the kitchen sink," says Jim Krog, a Florida Democratic lobbyist. In 1994, Krog was chief of staff to Gov. Lawton Chiles and ran his reelection campaign. In that race he squared off against Castellanos. "He'll go after the jugular and rip it out," Krog says.
It was during that 1994 Florida campaign, working for Jeb Bush's first but failed bid for election, that Castellanos showed why he's considered one of the fathers of the modern attack ad.
Castellanos launched a classic October surprise. Less than two weeks before the election, with his candidate ahead in the polls, Castellanos produced a raw, emotionally charged spot featuring a Florida mother whose 10-year-old daughter had been murdered in 1980. On camera, she complained that Chiles had refused to sign the killer's death warrant, "because he's too liberal on crime." Addressing the people of Florida, the mother said, "I know Jeb Bush. He'll make criminals serve their sentences and enforce the death penalty. Lawton Chiles won't."
The accusation produced panic inside the Chiles campaign. "We had done all the research [on relevant death sentence cases] and we couldn't figure out how we missed this guy," says Krog. Aides quickly unearthed the answer: Florida courts were still hearing the killer's appeal, making it impossible for Chiles to act.
The Palm Beach Post condemned the attack ad as a "despicable lie that proves again why Jeb [Bush] is unfit to be governor." The Orlando Sun-Sentinel accused Bush of demagoguery, protesting the spot was "shamelessly false, irresponsible and tasteless," while the Miami Herald complained it had "sunk to new depths."
The ads backfired on Bush, allowing Chiles to win one of the closest gubernatorial races in Florida history. "You've got to be sure of your facts. Even with a lot of money, bad facts override it every time," says Krog.
And that wasn't even Castellanos' most infamous attack ad. In 1990, working for Republican Sen. Jesse Helms of North Carolina, he produced perhaps the most racially divisive TV ad in campaign history. Called "White Hands," it featured an angry white worker crumpling up a job rejection notice. He had lost out because "they had to give it to a minority."
More recently, in 2000, his firm National Media produced an ad mocking Al Gore's stance on prescription drugs, flashing the word "RATS" on the screen for a split second. Castellanos denied using subliminal advertising. Forced on the defensive, Bush had to yank the spot.
Over the years Castellanos has produced a trail of caustic ads either pulled off the air, like the Bush spot in Florida, or judged by his own Republican clients to be too misleading or biting for public consumption. Yet today, because of his expertise at the negative, he has been given a central role in the Bush campaign.
His Democratic Party counterparts grant Castellanos grudging respect and understand the reason the Bush campaign has tapped him. "He's one of the most talented people in either party, and I wish he was on our side," says former Clinton aide Paul Begala, now a Democratic consultant and CNN commentator. "It's like at the end of those old Batman episodes, when they catch the villain, and the police chief turns to Batman and Robin and says, 'If only he'd use that genius for good.' That's how I feel about Alex."
"He's smart as hell," adds Krog, who recently worked with the Republican strategist for a statewide voter initiative in Florida. "He cuts right to an issue and finds the throbbing vein as quickly as anyone I've ever seen."
But does Castellanos play the campaign game fairly? "Considering there are no rules, I suppose he does," says Harrison Hickman, who worked as Sen. John Edwards' pollster during his presidential run this year.
One characteristic that sets Castellanos apart from some of the nondescript Washington-based political consultants is that he's a red-meat ideologue, who offers no apologies for his assertive -- some would say crude -- attacks.
"Other consultants create hard-hitting ads but tend to be more apologetic about it," says Dan Schnur, a California Republican strategist who served as communications director for Sen. John McCain's presidential run in 2000. "Most consultants like what they do, but they also want to be invited into polite society. He creates sharp-edged stuff and will admit it. That's made him some enemies and earned him attention."
"He doesn't just make the ads and say, 'It's just a business and somebody has to do it,'" says Hickman. "He makes the ads and really believes them. He's not above politics, which is admirable in a way."
Castellanos is also not above spreading disinformation. In 2002, trying to turn the Enron scandal against the Democrats, Castellanos appeared on CNN and ABC, insisting that Enron CEO Ken Lay had slept in the Lincoln Bedroom at the invitation of President Clinton. The tale was reported far and wide, but it was completely false.
