SARASOTA - People say that they hate negative campaign ads, but Florida's Republican primary showed again that they work. Mitt Romney won big after waging a big campaign to attack rival Newt Gingrich.
"Thank you, Florida," Romney told a crowd in Tampa gathered to celebrate his victory. He can also thank his better-funded campaign, and his willingness to use it to take on Gingrich directly in negative TV ads that Gingrich likened to carpet bombing.
And the reason is simple.
“They've been proven to work,” says James Curran, Ph.D., a marketing professor at USF Sarasota-Manatee. “If they didn't work, all of these politicians wouldn't be using them.”
Ninety-two percent of all the TV ads for the Florida primary attacked another candidate, according to the New York Times. Exit polls showed that 40% of voters said that ads played a significant role in their choice.
Gingrich's surge in South Carolina knocked Romney off what appeared to be a sure stride to the GOP nomination. When he went negative in Florida, Romney rallied to re-assume front-runner status. But some Republicans fear that the the negativity – however effective, and even necessary, now – could hurt the party's nominee this fall.
“Negative ads are an embarrassment for the entire party,” says Joe Gruters, Chairman of the Republican Party of Sarasota County. “It's just an unfortunate part of the political process.”
But they might not always work the way a candidate wants. Curran says that studies have shown that attack ads don't just shed their targets in bad light.
“There can be kind of a whiplash or boomerang effect that will go back and it can hurt the source,” he says.
An NBC/Wall Street Journal poll showed Romney's unfavorable rating rising by 20 percent since November among independents, in a possible sign that negative ads working for him now could work against him should he get to challenge President Obama in the general election.
But after a 14-point win in Florida, Romney has found a formula that works. As one aide is reported to have said, "we're not taking the boot off Gingrich's neck." And whichever candidate ultimately survives the attacks does gain experience defending against them.
“It's better to expose some of these open wounds now,” says Gruters, “than a month before the election.”
