Hispanic Caucus-linked PAC pours new ad spending into Arizona Senate race

PHOENIX — The PAC affiliated with the Congressional Hispanic Caucus is making its first foray into the 2024 general election advertising battles, backing Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego in the Arizona Senate race.

The group, CHC BOLD PAC, said it is splashing about $1.1 million on cable, radio and digital ads targeting Latina matriarchs across the battleground state.

The ad, titled “La Jefas” (“The Bosses”), hit the air in Spanish and Spanglish. “Grandmothers, mothers, sisters — bosses,” a narrator says, with the soft sounds of an acoustic guitar and a trumpet in the background. “In the Senate, he’ll fight for them,” the narrator promises about Gallego. 

The PAC told NBC News that $689,415 of the investment would go into Spanish broadcast spots, while $250,000 was spent on digital advertising and $158,000 on statewide Spanish radio. Altogether, it’s the biggest spend in the group’s 23-year history. 

The PAC’s executive director, Victoria McGroary, said the outlay in Arizona is just the first the group plans to make this election season. McGroary confirmed more Latino Democratic Senate and House candidates will get investments but didn’t share specifics about who can expect an injection of cash.

Gallego’s campaign has vastly outraised and outspent Republican Kari Lake’s in the hotly contested Arizona Senate race. In the second fundraising quarter, he raised $10.4 million for his campaign, while Lake raked in $4.3 million. Gallego has poured that into advertising, splashing more than $16.6 million on TV ads so far, according to AdImpact.

A recent analysis from AdImpact shows Phoenix as the country’s third-most targeted political ad market, with $107.5 million worth of spots set to run between Labor Day and Election Day. The only two ad markets more flush with political ad cash are Philadelphia and Las Vegas, with $127.4 million and $107.6 million in political programming scheduled to run in those markets, respectively. All three are the biggest media markets in key swing states in both the presidential race and the battle for the Senate.

McGroary projected confidence in Gallego’s standing against Lake. But, she said, “that does not mean that we are not all hands on deck and that our foot is absolutely not on the gas.”

Lake and Gallego are scheduled to square off in a debate on Oct. 9, hosted by Arizona Clean Elections, the traditional administrator of the state’s political debates. A new dispute about the debate kicked off last week, with Lake releasing a statement calling for Arizona’s Green Party candidate, Eduardo Quintana, to be included on the stage. Quintana failed to meet criteria for automatic inclusion in the debate.