AMES, Iowa — That didn’t take long. Less than 48 hours after former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney took the stage at the Iowa State Fair, the Democratic National Committee released a new television advertisement invoking his view of corporations.

Romney told a heckler that “corporations are people, my friend,” during a heated exchange Thursday at the Des Moines Register soapbox. Less than two days later, the DNC used footage of those words in an ad running on broadcast and cable stations in Des Moines.

Democrats are attempting not to be left out of the political conversation during the Ames straw poll this weekend. Republicans estimate at least 15,000 state GOP activists will descend on the Iowa State University campus Saturday to vote for one of the nine candidates on the ballot.

Romney said he’s not making a serious effort to compete in the straw poll this year. But Democrats believe otherwise and have focused on criticizing the presumed national frontrunner more than any other GOP contender.

One of President Barack Obama’s former top aides, Bill Burton, contacted reporters Saturday morning with an email attacking “Romney’s artificially low expectations in Ames.” Burton, speaking on behalf of Priorities USA Action, an independent expenditure committee, noted that Romney won the same poll by a 14-point margin in 2007.

“Romney has enlisted a string of high-profile Iowa endorsers, leads public polling in Iowa and is sitting on $13 million in campaign cash, not counting his vast personal fortune,” Burton wrote. “The Romney spin that they aren’t competing or even concerned about the results in Iowa doesn’t stand up to the facts.”

Watch the ad: