{"id":3136,"date":"2008-04-23T16:43:00","date_gmt":"2008-04-23T22:43:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2008\/04\/wilson-says-new-pearce-ad-attacks-domenici\/"},"modified":"2008-04-23T16:43:00","modified_gmt":"2008-04-23T22:43:00","slug":"wilson-says-new-pearce-ad-attacks-domenici","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2008\/04\/wilson-says-new-pearce-ad-attacks-domenici\/","title":{"rendered":"Wilson says new Pearce ad attacks Domenici"},"content":{"rendered":"

Republican Steve Pearce<\/a> is up with a new TV ad identifying him as the only conservative in the U.S. Senate race, and GOP primary opponent Heather Wilson<\/a> is attacking him for what she says is an insult to the retiring senator they\u2019re both seeking to replace. <\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s Pearce\u2019s new ad, which is running statewide:<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

<\/embed><\/object><\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

In it, he says he\u2019s \u201cthe only New Mexico<\/st1:place><\/st1:state> congressman to oppose a disastrous government-run socialized medicine scheme.\u201d He also calls himself the only conservative in the race, saying he has worked to cut taxes, eliminate wasteful spending and defend \u201cour traditional New Mexican values.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>\u201cIt\u2019s a fact. There\u2019s only one conservative running for Senate \u2013 Republican Steve Pearce,\u201d the narrator of the ad states.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The Wilson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> campaign quickly responded when the ad began running on Tuesday with a news release accusing Pearce of attacking Wilson and U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici<\/a>. Wilson and Domenici joined New Mexico<\/st1:state>\u2019s two Democratic members of Congress last year in supporting an expansion of the State Children\u2019s Health Insurance Program<\/a>, while Pearce stood alone in the New Mexico<\/st1:place><\/st1:state> delegation in opposing it.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

In fact, Pearce frequently stands alone. He said as much during the debate<\/a> between him and Wilson in Alamogordo<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> in February.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cI have done it time and time again in the New Mexico<\/st1:place><\/st1:state> delegation, standing alone,\u201d Pearce said.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The implication is certainly that he often thinks everyone else in the delegation is wrong, and he appears to be referring to Domenici along with the others in the new ad. But is it an attack on them? Wilson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> thinks so.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>\u201cWhat bothers me most as a loyal Republican is that Congressman Pearce isn\u2019t just attacking me. \u2026 He\u2019s launched his campaign with an ad criticizing Senator Pete Domenici as well,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Wilson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> may be trying to ensure that Republicans loyal to Domenici are offended by Pearce\u2019s ad. But she might also be trying to tie herself to Domenici and his legacy. In the news release, she points out that Domenici took an active role in creating the SCHIP program in the late 1990s. Wilson and Domenici voted last year to expand the program and also place some new checks on the funding designed to ensure that undocumented immigrations couldn\u2019t take advantage of it. Wilson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> was one of the biggest GOP champions of the legislation last year.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

In voting against the expansion, Pearce called it socialized medicine and said that\u2019s not what the United States<\/st1:place><\/st1:country-region> needs. The Pearce campaign didn\u2019t respond to a request for a response to Wilson<\/st1:city><\/st1:place>\u2019s complaint about the new ad.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Pearce is also up with a new radio ad attacking Wilson for missing votes in the House last week while she was in New Mexico campaigning. I haven\u2019t heard the ad and don\u2019t have a copy but, according to the Albuquerque Journal<\/a>, Pearce accuses Wilson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> in the ad of being \u201ctoo busy playing politics to do her job.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The Wilson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> campaign has not provided a response to the radio ad, but it\u2019s an issue about which the two have been sparring for a week.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Expect this primary race to get even more brutal in the next six weeks. Wilson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city>\u2019s campaign says it plans to start airing television ads soon.<\/p>\n

\n

Update, April 24, 9:40 a.m.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\n

Wilson<\/st1:place><\/st1:City> spokeswoman Whitney Cheshire had this to say about Pearce\u2019s radio ad:<\/p>\n

\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cHeather Wilson has voted 98 percent of the time out of over 6,000 votes cast. This is just another negative attack to distort her record,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Republican Steve Pearce is up with a new TV ad identifying him as the only conservative in the U.S. Senate race, and GOP primary opponent Heather Wilson is attacking him for what she says is an insult to the retiring senator they\u2019re both seeking to replace. Here\u2019s Pearce\u2019s new ad, which is running statewide: In […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3136","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3136","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3136"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3136\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}