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A group promoting North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum’s Republican presidential bid is pouring nearly $4 million into a new TV advertising blitz targeting Iowa and New Hampshire.
The $3.9 million ad buy from Best of America PAC — details of which were shared first with NBC News — will pay the airtime for a 30-second spot that the group previously aired nationally, featuring footage from Burgum’s campaign launch in June.
"Conservative business leader Doug Burgum," the narrator begins, between excerpts from Burgum’s debut speech. "Raised with small town values, Burgum built a billion-dollar company, creating thousands of jobs. As governor of North Dakota, he cut taxes, balanced the budget and helped pass term limits."
Burgum, who ran a software company that he eventually sold to Microsoft, has tapped his personal wealth and business ties to help him navigate the early days of a GOP race that he entered without a national political profile. His campaign offered $20 gift cards to those who contributed $1 — a gambit to meet the Republican National Committee’s unique donor threshold for qualifying for the first debate this month in Milwaukee.
Best of America has raised $11 million in its early days, aided by a $2 million donation from one of Burgum’s family members.
"As we look forward to Gov. Burgum’s debut on the debate stage later this month, we’re making sure New Hampshire and Iowa know that he will turn around our economy, unleash American energy and rebuild our military so we can win the Cold War with China," said Emily Benavides, a spokesperson for Best of America.
Iowa is slated to host the GOP's first presidential nominating caucuses in January, with New Hampshire to follow with the party's first primary.
A recent New York Times/Siena College poll showed Burgum at 1% among likely Republican voters in Iowa, far behind the front-runner, former President Donald Trump. In New Hampshire, an NHJournal/co-efficient poll measured support for the governor at 4% among likely GOP primary voters in that state.