Christine Drazan Ad: Opponents Will ‘Say Anything’ to Keep Democrats in Power in Oregon

Oregon Republican gubernatorial candidate Christine Drazan released a new political advertisement on Wednesday, accusing her two opponents of being willing to say whatever it takes to “keep the governor’s office in the hands of the Democrats.”

The advertisement, entitled “Rotten,” is running statewide on television and digital and features the former Oregon House Republican Leader taking aim at Betsy Johnson, a former Democrat state senator running as an independent, and far-left former Oregon House Speaker Tina Kotek.

“Career politicians are rotten to the core. That’s what my family used to say, that powerful people only care about power. My opponents have held power for a generation. They will say anything to keep the governor’s office in the hands of the Democrats for another decade of decline,” Drazan says in the advertisement. “They believe they are entitled to power, so they lie and distract and divide. But when something is this rotten, it’s time to throw it out.”

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The three-way race has been rated a “toss-up” by some political analysts, who see burgeoning discontent with far-left leadership and policies as a potential catalyst for change. Recent polling has shown Drazan (33 percent) narrowly leading Kotek (32 percent) and ahead of Johnson by a greater margin (21 percent) and found that a strong majority of likely Oregon voters express pessimism about the direction of the deep blue state.

The results are within the survey’s ±4.92 percent margin of error, though the narrow gap between Drazan and Kotek could be significant given that the current Democrat Gov. Kate Brown (D) — who is wildly unpopular — beat her GOP competitor by roughly 6 points in the 2018 election.

Drazan’s Campaign Manager Trey Rosser released a statement, saying that both Kotek’s and Johnson’s legacies show nothing but “failure.”

“Tina Kotek and Betsy Johnson have spent decades in power and have nothing to show for it but failure. If they were able or willing to solve Oregon’s challenges, they would’ve done so by now. Christine Drazan is leading them both in the polls because Oregonians know she’s the only candidate ready to deliver change this November,” Rosser said.