One of President Joe Biden's longshot Democratic challengers released an ad Friday in which Bigfoot searches for the incumbent in New Hampshire.
Rep. Dean Phillips's (D., Minn.) campaign launched the advertisement, which slams Biden for not campaigning in the Granite State, with a $300,000 buy, according to Politico. The campaign also produced a "Not in New Hampshire" website with statistics about Biden's presence in the state.
"I'm something of an expert on elusive creatures, so I challenged myself to find President Biden in New Hampshire during this primary season," Bigfoot says in the ad. "I thought I was good at hiding, so I asked around, 'Have you seen Joe?' I mean, how can you have tens of thousands of people looking for you all the time and not one person finds you?"
The sasquatch did, however, report seeing Phillips "everywhere."
Incumbent presidents running for reelection do not typically focus much of their campaign resources on primaries. Though President Donald Trump held a rally on the eve of the February 2020 Republican primary in New Hampshire, President Barack Obama did not campaign there in early 2012.
Early last year, the Democratic National Committee, at Biden's urging, attempted to modify the schedule of primary elections and put South Carolina's primary, in which Biden performed well in 2020, before New Hampshire's. Democratic leaders had sought to end New Hampshire's tradition of holding the first primary election in the country in order to allow a more diverse state to take the influential spot in the primary schedule.
Not wanting to give up the Granite State's status as the first primary in the country after the Iowa caucuses, state officials ignored the policy and said they would schedule their primary before South Carolina's. Biden then chose to stay off the ballot rather than contradict the committee's new rules. Biden's allies are mounting an effort to write in the president on the ballots, though DNC officials said they would not award delegates based on the unsanctioned primary, making it so that the results will not impact the nomination.
The president began campaigning nationally soon into the new year. He gave a speech in Valley Forge, Pa., originally scheduled for the third anniversary of the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot, but the campaign moved it to the night before due to weather. Days later, Biden spoke at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, S.C., where a white supremacist killed nine people in a 2015 mass shooting. Pro-Palestinian protesters heckled Biden and interrupted the speech before security escorted them out.