DCCC, Schmidt camp trade barbs over energy vote

The campaign of Rep. Jean Schmidt (R-Ohio) is in a tussle with the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC), which accused the lawmaker of lying about her voting record on energy issues.

In an ad featuring an impersonator of President Bush thanking Schmidt for her support of “Big Oil,” the DCCC criticized the lawmaker for “voting to keep giving billions in tax breaks to the big oil companies.”

{mosads}Schmidt responded to the ad by telling the Cincinnati Enquirer that she was not in office when the tax breaks were voted on in 2005. The DCCC countered that the ad referred to a vote from earlier this year and accused her of lying.

“Once again, Congresswoman Schmidt proves that, whenever she is challenged and is forced to defend her voting record, she simply resorts to lies, smears and urban legends,” said DCCC spokesman Ryan Rudominer. “Maybe if Congresswoman Schmidt paid half as much attention to middle-class families struggling to pay skyrocketing gas prices as she does to protecting Big Oil's record profits, we would finally hear something else from Schmidt besides more lies.”

Bruce Pfaff, Schmidt’s campaign press secretary, immediately returned fire.

“Once again, the Democrats want to attack Rep. Schmidt because they do not have an agenda to do anything to address the rising price of oil … you can’t tax oil companies into cheaper prices,” he said.

Pfaff also attacked the Democratic ad campaign, calling it a “publicity stunt.”

“They lied about how much money they put behind it. They announced they were spending $100,000 on the ad buy, but they only spent $775 in our district,” said Pfaff. “You will literally be able to count on two hands how many people will hear this ad.”