The Congressional Leadership Fund began running a blistering television ad that calls Democrat Jason Crow “another all-talk, no-action politician,” and attacks him for missing a third of meetings of the state’s Board of Veterans Affairs, of which he was a member for five years.
The 30-second spot accuses him of turning “his back on Colorado’s veterans.”
Crow and his campaign have vehemently pushed back against the ad as being misleading, with Crow saying he was “disgusted” by the group linked to House Speaker Paul Ryan.
(Ryan visited Colorado last week for a fundraiser, The Sun has learned.)
Crow, a former Army Ranger who deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan, had this to say about the veterans board to the Colorado Sun: “That was a volunteer community board and it travels around the state. I don’t look at the specific numbers of what specific meetings people attended and did not. I know everyone did the best they could to attend as many meetings as they could to fight for veterans in this community. Obviously I was a young parent the time and my service was applauded and members of the board stand with me.”
The Congressional Leadership Fund has already dumped more than $1.5 million into television ads in Colorado this cycle.
U.S. Rep. Mike Coffman: The incumbent Republican’s campaign released two positive ads touting his work on behalf of the Ethiopian community, bipartisanship and pushback against his own party.
Those are part of a $1.4 million ad buy placed by the campaign that began running on Aug. 22 and goes through Election Day, a campaign spokesman says.
Also on Tuesday the Crow campaign unveiled a new ad, touting his military service and upbringing in a 30-second spot. The Democrat is working to match Coffman’s combat record and leadership, and the new spot features Crow saying, “9/11 happened and I couldn’t ask people that I knew to do my fighting for me.”
This story first ran in The Colorado Sun’s politics newsletter, The Unaffiliated. You can subscribe here: cosun.co/theunaffiliated