Special Interest Groups Ratchet Up Negative Ads in New Hampshire Senate Race
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The Keene Sentinel
Joe Vines
Boston University Washington News Service
September 25, 2008
WASHINGTON− National business and labor groups such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Service Employees International Union are playing an increasingly visible role in the New Hampshire Senate race between Republican Sen. John Sununu and former Democratic Gov. Jeanne Shaheen.
The organizations are running television advertisements lambasting the two candidates for their records on issues ranging from the cost of prescription drugs to tax policy.
The Chamber of Commerce ad, titled “tax machine,” is set in what appears to be the 1920s. The ad depicts cars crashing and a bridge collapsing under a train’s weight and plummeting to the ground below, while criticizing Shaheen for proposing additional income taxes.
“The allegation about the income tax is absolutely, patently false,” said Kate Bedingfield, the Shaheen campaign’s communications director. “She threatened to veto an income tax and was responsible for killing the legislation that would have implemented it.”
Bedingfield acknowledged that Shaheen proposed a 2.5 percent sales tax, but only after a state Supreme Court decision mandated that the state play a bigger role in paying for local public education. “When she was governor, New Hampshire had the lowest tax burden in the nation,” Bedingfield said.
The chamber promotes business issues and a free-enterprise agenda before Congress and the states, according to the organization’s Web site.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is not affiliated with the Greater Keene Chamber of Commerce, said Thomas Dowling, president of the local organization.
“The Greater Keene Chamber of Commerce does not support or disparage any political candidate,” Dowling wrote in a statement to the Sentinel. “We use our energy and resources to engage the diverse segments of our regional economy in the common goal of creating a better business community and a better place to live, work, play and raise a family.”
The U.S. Chamber will spend $20 million to elect “pro-business” candidates this cycle, according to J.P. Fielder, a spokesman. He said that the ads follow all legal protocols. “The ads speak for themselves, that they reflect the views of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. I wouldn’t think anyone would assume otherwise,” Fielder said.
Sununu too is taking heat from third party groups. The Service Employees International Union recently sponsored an ad criticizing Sununu for opposing an amendment to a Senate budget bill that the union says would have lowered prescription drug prices. The campaign declined to comment on Sununu’s vote on the amendment.
The SEIU represents approximately 2 million health-care and public service workers, according to the organization’s Web site. The ad buy cost $600,000, according to a press release.
“As they did in 2002, we know that the liberal special-interest groups will again spend millions of dollars trying to distort Sen. John Sununu’s record of independent leadership for New Hampshire families,” Sununu campaign press secretary Stefani Zimmerman said in a statement.
Advertising by third-party groups has become commonplace in political campaigns, particularly this election cycle. “Unfortunately third-party spending is a fact of political life right now,” Shaheen aide Bedingfield said. There’s nothing we can do to control them. It’s unfortunate, but it’s a fact of political life right now.”
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