Karl Rove's American Crossroads has painted Hillary Clinton as a tool of Wall Street. | AP Photo Clinton super PAC answers Rove ad

With an uncomfortably tight race in Iowa days ahead of the Feb. 1 caucus, the super PAC backing Hillary Clinton is using some of its muscle to try and undo a damaging narrative that the Democratic front-runner is beholden to Wall Street.

The super PAC, Priorities USA Action, has made a six-figure digital ad buy to respond to a ad targeting Iowa that attacks Clinton as a tool of Wall Street and is funded by Republican strategist Karl Rove’s PAC, American Crossroads.


The Rove ad hits Clinton for taking “54 times more money from Wall Street interests than from all of Iowa” and claims that “Wall Street made her a multi-millionaire. ... Does Iowa really want Wall Street in the White House?”

In an interview with ABC News over the weekend, Clinton laughed off the attack ad. “I think it shows how desperate the Republicans are to prevent me from becoming the nominee,” she said. “I find that, in a perverse way, an incredibly flattering comment on their anxiety, because they know that not only will I stand up for what the country needs, I will take it to the Republicans.”

Her allies, apparently, weren’t sharing in the laugh.

In the new spot set to post early Tuesday, the PAC tries to shift the conversation from one that has proved to be a loser topic for Clinton to more fertile ground: guns and reproductive rights.

“They know Hillary’s the only one strong enough to stop Wall Street abuses and make the wealthy pay their fair share,” a voice-over in the ad states. “She’ll stand up to the gun lobby and take on the NRA. And Hillary Clinton will protect funding for Planned Parenthood and protect a woman’s right to choose.”

Those are topics Clinton actually wants to talk about, as opposed to defending her connections to Wall Street. Like Rove, the Sanders camp has identified Clinton's Wall Street connection as one of her biggest weaknesses among Democratic primary voters.

At Sunday night’s debate, Sanders compared himself to Clinton, saying, "I don’t get personal speaking fees from Goldman Sachs.”

In a statement, Priorities USA chief strategist Guy Cecil said: “Karl Rove and the Republicans are trying to interfere in the Iowa Democratic caucus because they don’t want to run against Hillary Clinton in November. We're not going to let that stand.”

