JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. – With limited primary opposition, Attorney General Chris Koster quietly campaigned in his quest for governor, but with two ads released in the hours following the election, he’s sprung into focus.
Koster aired a minute-long TV ad across the state during the 10 p.m. newscasts, just as Eric Greitens was clinching the Republican nomination. Later, the Republican Governors Association released a spot attacking Koster.
Koster’s ad reintroduces him to Missouri voters. He touts his rural roots and his time putting away criminals as a prosecutor in Cass County. He also vows to fight federal overreach, explaining that as attorney general he sued the Environmental Protection Agency.
Transcript:
There were no lobbyists or fancy offices in Harrisonville. As county prosecutor my job was simple: put away the bad guys, take care of the people they hurt. I didn’t fight against domestic violence by making speeches, I put the abuser behind bars and made sure the woman with the black eye, and her kids, had a place to sleep. For those 10 years my job was helping people in the small towns of rural Missouri person by person. I’m Chris Koster and as attorney general that job’s never changed. Protecting victims of violence and corruption, putting crooked corporate big shots in prison, even suing Barack Obama’s EPA to keep federal regulators off our land. Through it all I’ve learned our government works best if every step is about helping people person by person
I’m Chris Koster and I’m running for governor of the state of Missouri.
But Missouri could be a priority for national Republicans trying to pick up a state that’s eluded their grasp, despite presidential candidates winning the state. While consistently blue states like Maryland and Massachusetts have elected Republican governors in recent years, Missouri’s governorship has remained blue as two-term Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon held on.
The RGA quickly released an ad Wednesday marking Koster as a political opportunist, criticizing pay raises for staff at in the attorney general’s office, an office remodel and more than $100,000 in state-funded plane flights.
Transcript:
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch said Chris Koster is a political opportunist who didn’t follow through on his pledge to Missouri. As Missouri families struggled to make ends meet, Koster dished out over $1 million of pay raises to his government staff. Koster snagged over $3 million in public money for an office makeover and spent over $100,000 to jet around on taxpayer-funded planes. Chris Koster just another self-serving politician putting himself first.
It will be interesting to see if the “opportunist” label sticks to Koster in this race. The RGA’s ad comes just after Greitens clinched the nomination, setting up a race between a Democrat who used to be a Republican and a Republican who used to be a Democrat.
Koster has been a member of his party longer than Greitens has been a Republican. But Republicans couldn’t do much damage to Greitens with similar charges. Despite several ads in the final weeks of the primary attacking Greitens over his party switch and calling him a liberal, he cleared the field by nearly 10 points.
