Twitter didn’t disappoint when it came to taking down the Scottish Tory leader’s latest PR stunt

Ruth Davidson with the caption "im backing Team Ruth"
Brian Finlay


On 26 July, the Scottish Conservatives sent out a tweet to find out who wanted to back Scottish Tory leader Ruth Davidson. The tweet provided a link to “help her” by donating to or joining the Scottish Conservative Party. It also claimed that “It’s only Ruth Davidson who can lead the fight against the SNP”:

The polls

Scottish Conservatives sent the tweet after news broke of the SNP preparing for a possible snap general election. The SNP currently dominates the Westminster voting intentions, with 42% of the vote. The Scottish Conservatives are in second place, with 24%, and Scottish Labour is in third place with 23%. In current UK wide polls, Labour is ahead of the Conservatives in Westminster voting intentions.

As the Tories attempted to drum up support for their leader, Twitter certainly didn’t disappoint with comebacks.

The reaction

The thread of the Scottish Conservatives’ “Team Ruth” post was littered with comments about recent Brexit revelations:

Some people commented on the secretary of state for Scotland’s claim of a “power bonanza” for the Scottish Parliament after Brexit:

Others raised the absence of Scottish Conservatives’ policies [pdf] that diverge from the UK Conservative Party:

And of course, there is an ongoing call for Ruth Davidson to speak out over the ‘dark money’ allegations:

The chair of Welfare Scotland, Rob McDowall, decided to respond with a video politely declaring he was “Team Nicola”:

When Tories try to be personable

When Tories try to be personable, it tends to backfire. Just like Theresa May when she explained [paywall] how she likes to unwind from her stressful job:

PR stunts don’t seem to go very well for the Tories. Perhaps voters would have more respect for the Conservatives if they’d just get on and call another general election.

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Featured image via Scottish Conservatives/Twitter

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