Smith continues to highlight Merkley's February fundraising

The Senate ad war keeps on getting nastier.

Last week, after sitting on the sidelines for the past few months while being attacked by the Democrats, Sen. Gordon Smith took on both Speaker Jeff Merkley and Steve Novick in one ad. Now Smith has narrowed his sights on Merkley, once again focusing on the Speaker’s fundraising activity during the February special session, launching his attack less than two weeks before the Democratic primary.

R.C. Hammond, Smith’s communications director, said the campaign ran the ad because “Jeff Merkley was the first candidate to attack Gordon Smith, and Smith responded.”

The ad once again resurrects a story that has haunted Merkley since February: whether or not he violated his own ethics law by accepting campaign contributions during the legislative session. Detractors have accused Merkley of breaching the spirit of the law. Smith clearly thinks Merkley did more than that: “he broke his rule and took thousands from special interests from lobbyists,” the new ad states.

After receiving the green light from the Legislative Counsel Committee in January, Merkley decided to accept money from individuals, but not from lobbyists or special interests registered in the state of Oregon.

The campaign said it extensively vetted every contribution, even returning a $75 check from Paul Evans who is an advisor to Governor Ted Kulongoski.

“We never accepted a contribution from and individual or a group that had business before the Legislature,” said Matt Canter, Merkley’s spokesman.

According to Canter, the campaign took exhaustive steps to ensure they stuck to their promise. A memo from Campaign Manager Jon Issacs tells staff that “every contribution received after the start of and before the end of the February session must be vetted against the list of registered Oregon lobbyists available on the Oregon Government Ethics Commission (OGEC) website.”

Although the campaign was careful to vet contributions against the list of registered Oregon lobbyists and not accept their contributions, Merkley did accept money from a number of lobbyists not registered in Oregon.

During the session, two lobbyists from a Seattle based firm, Strategies 360, donated a total of $1,500 to the campaign. A lobbyist with Denny Miller McBee Associates, based in Washington D.C., also donated $1,000. The firm’s clients, such as Boeing, are primarily defense related.

When asked about the contributions, Canter continued to maintain “that the ad is false and misleads voters; Merkley refused to accept money from lobbyists or special interests that had business in Oregon. He ensured that the spirit of the rules would be followed.”

“He went beyond what Smith was willing to do while the Senate was in session,” Canter said. “The ad is hypocritical and misleading.”

Of course, the Senate has been in session for most of the election cycle, which would have imposed a much longer time constraint had Smith chosen to adopt a similar ban.

Canter also thinks both the new ad and the previous one show Smith’s backhanded support for Novick’s candidacy. “It's clear from this new ad that Smith fears Merkley most and is trying to influence the outcome of the primary election,” he said, also noting the craftiness of the last line in Smith’s ad: “Jeff Merkley, more of the same when it’s time for a change,” a sentiment that Novick has wielded throughout his Senate campaign.

Smith’s second hit on Merkley has raised the ire of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, which took the opportunity to expound on Smith’s own fundraising record in regard to special interests: “Gordon Smith is lying about Jeff Merkley’s record because he knows that Jeff Merkley can beat him in November,” DSCC spokesman Matthew Miller said. “The truth is that Smith took hundreds of thousands of dollars from the oil and pharmaceutical industries and their lobbyists in Washington, and then voted to protect their profits instead of giving lower prices to consumers. Smith knows he can’t defend his record, so instead he’s launching false negative ads against Jeff Merkley.”