Clinton, Romney float charges of dirty tricks as nominating contests tighten

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney both lashed out at rivals Tuesday, accusing them of underhanded campaign techniques amid a tightening campaign for the presidential nominations in both parties.  

Clinton’s (D-N.Y.) campaign lobbed the term “dirty tricks” at chief rival Sen. Barack Obama’s (Ill.) campaign Monday night, forcing Obama’s staff to offer a denial.

{mosads}Barb Therriault, of Plymouth, N.H., was one of several Clinton supporters who said they were contacted by Obama supporters and bullied for their support of Clinton, offered incorrect voting information or asked to describe the effectiveness of attack lines targeting Clinton.

Therriault told The Hill she was cooking dinner last Tuesday night when a young man called her, identified himself with Obama and then became very aggressive when Therriault said she was supporting Clinton and offered her reasons why.

Therriault, whose number was provided to The Hill by the Clinton campaign, said it seemed like a “run-of-the-mill campaign call,” but after the caller “became very aggressive,” she hung up.

“I didn’t appreciate him questioning my judgment,” Therriault said.

Clinton campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle sent out an e-mail to supporters detailing some of the reported push polls or negative calls and asking supporters who experience something similar to notify the campaign’s headquarters.

Obama’s campaign said accusations that it had anything to do with the calls were baseless.

“This flat-out falsehood is the latest attack in a silly season where our opponents have promised to stop at nothing in an effort to tarnish Barack Obama’s character,” Obama spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in an e-mail. “Push-polling or tactics of confusion have no place in this campaign and we don’t or won’t engage in them.”

Meanwhile, in the GOP race, former Massachusetts Gov. Romney’s (R) campaign filed a complaint Tuesday with the Iowa attorney general asking him to investigate a third-party group making phone calls in the state on former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee’s behalf. The third-party group was reportedly making negative claims about other GOP candidates.

“Our campaign has nothing to do with the push-polling, and I wish they would stop,” Huckabee said in a press interview. “We don’t want this kind of campaigning because it violates the spirit of our campaign. I don’t want to become president because I disabled the other candidates, I want to become president because I am the best candidate.”

This is the second time Romney has made such a request of a state attorney general. Last month, Romney and other Republicans asked New Hampshire’s attorney general to investigate reports of push-polling aimed at bringing a negative light to Romney’s Mormon faith. The difference with the latest complaint from Romney, however, is that his campaign has found a target in Huckabee, his chief rival in Iowa. In the first case, the call’s perpetrators were able to maintain their anonymity.

“It is particularly offensive that a Mike Huckabee advocacy group would resort to a shadow effort using large sums of unregulated soft money to attack candidates by name with these reprehensible calls,” Romney spokesman Matt Rhoades said in a statement. “Gov. Huckabee cannot just stand by and feign outrage as these coordinated attacks are made in his name and for his benefit.

“The money men and organizers behind this effort headed a major Huckabee fundraiser less than one month ago and the executive director is a former associate of Huckabee’s campaign manager,” Rhoades continued. “Relying on the resources of an out-of-state soft money organization to run your ground game is awful politics and voters are right to be annoyed by this kind of conduct.”

Huckabee and campaign manager Chip Saltsman have both been vocal in their denunciation of the calls. A Huckabee spokeswoman declined to say whether Huckabee would join Romney in requesting the attorney general investigation.

Shadowy campaign tactics are nothing new in the primary season, as evidenced by the smear campaign Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) endured in South Carolina on his way to losing that state’s 2000 primary to President Bush.

But in Iowa, where voters have a reputation for rejecting candidates affiliated with nasty, attack-oriented campaigns, those tactics could cause significant damage to a campaign tied to, though not necessarily complicit in, their use.

The burden appears to be on the campaigns that benefit from the attacks to prove they want nothing to do with them.

However, several campaign aides have expressed suspicion that the victims in some of these cases were actually the perpetrators, and that they are looking to drum up sympathy.