A mysterious new outside group is warning that Donald Trump’s election could usher in an era of nuclear warfare and kill more people than live in Ohio’s largest city.
“One nuclear bomb can kill a million people. That’s more than all the men, women and children living in Columbus, Ohio,” the ad, which debuted in that city and others in the state on Monday, says.
Mushroom clouds from nuclear bombs interrupt a quiet cloudless day and scenes of debris fill the screen — just before a clip of Trump questioning America’s reluctance to use the warheads.
“Why are we making them?” he says in a clip of an interview.
That’s when another explosion appears.
“Be careful who you vote for,” the text reads.
The spot is created by a little-known super PAC called the Fifty Second Street Fund, a group founded just earlier this month. Its website contains nothing but the complete text of W.H. Auden’s famous poem, “September 1, 1939,” about the lead-up to Adolf Hitler’s invasion of Poland on that date.
Despite reporting virtually no fundraising as of September 30, the group has quickly bought about $200,000 in Ohio television advertising, according to new broadcast filings with the Federal Communications Commission. It is unclear whether the super PAC bought any cable television time.
It is not uncommon for super PACs to appear from nowhere late in the campaign season in order to take advantage of delayed donor disclosure laws. Any donation to a super PAC after this past Thursday will not be public until a month after Election Day.
Matt Henshon, a Boston-area lawyer and the treasurer of the group, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Monday evening.
Hillary Clinton’s campaign has similarly raised the specter of a Trump nuclear attack, releasing an ad two weeks ago featuring concerns from a former nuclear missile launch officer. Both ads evoke the legendary “Daisy” spot produced by President Lyndon B. Johnson’s campaign in 1964 against hardline Republican Barry Goldwater — and that ad similarly harkened back to the Auden poem.
“We must love one another,” the poem — roughly quoted by the narrator in the Daisy spot — goes, “or die.”