Yet again, a pro-Trump group has been caught using images of Russia in their ads about the purported greatness and/or scary not-greatness of America. This time it's the Lindberghian America First Action super PAC, some assembly required, and the footage that came from Russia is not of soldiers, military jets, or ominous-looking factories but "Man and Woman Playing With Baby Near The Window," a bit of stock footage that will set you back a mere $65 if you want to make an ad yourself. The Belarus-produced "Old Woman Looking Out The Window" that appears shortly afterwards, on the other hand, can be yours for the bargain price of five bucks less.
That's what Politico discovered, acting on a tip from a rival Democratic super PAC. You'd think that at the very least a group calling itself "America First" would want to support America's own robust library of dirt-cheap stock footage, but no. "America First" refers to hating immigrants using traditional, century-old white nationalist tropes. It doesn't mean supporting anyone in 'Merica with money.
This is not, of course, a major election-bending story, and America First Action super PAC Funtime Playset, figures not included, has very good reasons for not checking the origins of their stock footage of theoretically anti-Biden heartland angst. America First Action super PAC(TM) is run by Linda McMahon, cofounder of pro wrestling's WWE: Straight-up faking things is why the McMahon family is rich as snot right now. The McMahon family, and Linda's spokesperson, explained this to Politico in less-than-subtle terms for their story, and could not possibly care less about whether anything they put out is misleading—we also use footage from China, they boasted! Ha—it doesn't matter. It's all in fun. The important thing is that people in stock footage are living in stock footage-fear of Joe Biden putting the brakes on Linda's rich friends' reformation of American democracy into authoritarian-based kleptocracy.
It also should be pointed out that this massive, orchestrated attack on American democracy by rich, amoral Epstein-adjacent titans of America's most exploitative and corrupt industries is being done On The Cheap, and that means if there's a choice between a $65 clip of Man and Woman Playing With Baby in Russia or a $75 clip of Man and Woman Playing With Two Babies in Indiana, the giants of America First are going to keep their 10 bucks, thank you very much.
There's no particular message to be had here. It's just a brief moment of fun—no, wait. Actually, there is a message here. The message here is that you should presume everything you see in political advertising is absolutely fake. Pro-wrestling fake. Billionaire game show-level fake. Completely fake. On the conservative side, the Trump movement has demonstrated to political bigwigs (tallwigs? squarewigs?) that there is absolutely no penalty for faking the news outright, with stories about how Some Guy found a computer with Hunter Biden something-something or theories that well maybe actually Hillary Clinton set Donald Trump's team up to do a treason and so it shouldn't count.
Of course the footage you see on television ads isn't real. Even The New York Times keeps interviewing "undecided" voters who just happen on a Google search to come up as local Republican Party functionaries about as "undecided" as your dog is when it comes into charging into a stand of poison oak for no discernible reason. There's not a chance a super PAC run by known propagandists is going to fact-check their $300-and-change’s worth of stock footage before slapping it together.
For all you know the people you see in the America First Action super PAC Death Mountain Racetrack And Yogurt Dispenser are all dead and gone, and have been for years. That kid in Man and Woman Playing With Baby? That kid was eaten by tigers after falling into an animal exhibit in France. That kid no longer gives a damn what happens to Linda McMahon's personal tax rates.