The super PAC backing Ohio governor John Kasich for president released a new ad Thursday, casting outsider candidates Donald Trump and Ben Carson as unfit to respond to international crises like the attacks in France and charging that “on-the-job training for president does not work.”
The ad, from New Day for America, places images of Trump and Carson next to President Barack Obama as a narrator lists high-profile international developments: “Benghazi. Beheadings. Paris.”
“Our lives depend on a commander-in-chief with experience who understands the world,” the narrator says.
Kasich, seeking traction in the polls, has emphasized his decades of political experience as a selling point for his candidacy, contrasted with political neophytes like Trump and Carson.
Though the ad comes from an ostensibly independent Super PAC, Kasich had disavowed using the tragedy in Paris for political gain.
Speaking to the National Press Club on Tuesday, Kasich said, “We have to be careful that we don’t use this as an opportunity by anybody, and I’m not saying that they are at this point, to advance a candidacy.”
“Let’s get through this period of time,” he continued. “Let’s hear the different suggestions and ideas that people have. And then over time I think it will be appropriate to talk about what experience means when we’re talking about the Commander in Chief of the United States of America.”
The ad, titled “Commander in Chief,” will run in New Hampshire between October 1st and early February, according to New Day for America.
Jeremy Diamond contributed to this report.