John Rutherford: "Lenny Curry's plan will make our city safe again"

A few days before early voting began, a thirty second Lenny Curry ad, paid for by the Republican Party of Florida, hit Jacksonville airwaves to remind voters anew that Sheriff John Rutherford supports Curry for Mayor.

The ad, which does not mention Mayor Alvin Brown, with whom the Sheriff has some longstanding disagreements, takes a positive approach to the issue.

“Lenny Curry understands that the Mayor’s first priority must be to reduce crime and ensure public safety,” the Sheriff says, adding that “for a safer city and a better Jacksonville, I support Lenny Curry to be our next Mayor.”

A female voiceover makes the point, as the words “Lenny Curry will put more cops on the street and ensure safer neighborhoods” are superimposed over a picture of Curry with uniformed officers, that “working with the Sheriff and restoring the cops taken off our streets, Lenny’s plan will make our city safe again.”

Throughout much of the last fifteen seconds of the ad, the call to action — “Read Lenny’s plan at LennyCurryForMayor.com” — appears on the screen. One would expect that a salient measure of the ad’s effectiveness would be an increase in direct traffic to the candidate’s website.