With about a week to go until the state’s primary election, the candidates for the US Senate are bashing each other with a new round of television advertising.
Former Chattanooga Mayor Bob Corker aired an ad last week that criticized his primary challengers for raising their pay while in Congress, and for being lobbyists afterward. Former Congressmen Ed Bryant and Van Hilleary responded with ads of their own yesterday blasting Corker’s ad as untrue.
Vanderbilt political scientist John Geer says the negative campaign advertising helps the candidates differentiate themselves.
“These negative ads do have some things going for them. They tend to be more specific, more about issues and those are the things that voters want. And they tend, ironically, to come in the form of negative ads more than positive, and I say ironically, because the public tends not to like negative ads, but yet at the same time, they do want to talk about issues.”
It was revealed today that Corker added an additional 420-thousand dollars of his own money to his campaign earlier this week, bringing the total personal funds he’s spent to well over 2-million dollars.
Corker’s campaign introduced another ad yesterday defending his record on abortion.
On Air - 90.3 WPLN-FM