RGA Launches 2nd Ad Wave Linking Hickenlooper & Ritter

TV & Radio Ads, www.NoJobsJohn.com Highlight High Taxes, Lost Jobs –

 Hickenlooper Response Makes Joke While Serious Problems Face Coloradans

“John Hickenlooper and Bill Ritter are brothers in the fraternity of raising taxes and killing Colorado jobs.”

– Tim Murtaugh, Republican Governors Association

The Republican Governors Association today launched a second wave of television and radio ads as part of a campaign it began earlier this week, highlighting the similarities between Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper and the man he hopes to replace as governor, Bill Ritter.  Both Hickenlooper and Ritter have supported higher taxes and caused the loss of tens of thousands of jobs.  The ads are supported by an online advertising buy and the website www.NoJobsJohn.com.  Two prior ads, a television spot titled “Stripes” and a radio ad titled “Plague,” which sound similar themes, are still running. 

“John Hickenlooper and Bill Ritter are brothers in the fraternity of raising taxes and killing Colorado jobs.  They are politicians of the same stripe,” said Tim Murtaugh, spokesman for the Republican Governors Association.  “If you want to know what John Hickenlooper would do as governor, just take a look at what Bill Ritter has done.”

Both ads – the TV ad titled “39,000” and the radio ad called “Frontier” – detail how locally-headquartered Frontier Airlines protested that Hickenlooper’s high-tax policies would force them from the area.  Hickenlooper refused to address the company’s concerns, which caused Frontier to move hundreds of local jobs to Wisconsin and Indiana.  Overall, Hickenlooper has presided over more than 39,000 job losses.  This parallels Ritter’s record of pushing for higher taxes and shedding more than 100,000 jobs in Colorado.

Inexplicably, the Hicklooper campaign chose to respond to the discussion of increased taxes and thousands of lost jobs by cracking a joke.  “[N]ext ad they’ll be criticizing his beer,” the campaign told CBS4 in Denver.