McMahon targets Murphy’s financial difficulty in new ad in Conn. Senate race

by Alexandra Jaffe - 09/18/12 6:00 PM ET

Murphy sat on the House Financial Services Committee through the financial crisis, and the ad says he voted in favor of the bank bailout, and that his “favorite bank” — the same one that gave him the loan — got a $400-million bailout.

“Connect the dots,” a voiceover says at the end of the ad.

{mosads}The bank in question, Webster Bank, issued a release insisting Murphy had not received preferential treatment on the loan after McMahon’s campaign began to focus on the issue. But the McMahon campaign remained undaunted, calling for an ethics investigation into the loan earlier this month and issuing frequent releases asking questions of Murphy’s campaign — which continues to deny any impropriety.

Murphy campaign spokesperson Taylor Lavender insisted again in a statement that Murphy had engaged in no misconduct, and that the attacks were evidence that McMahon was trying to distract voters from her business record.

“The lies Linda McMahon is trying to sell voters in her latest ad have been debunked repeatedly by third party experts, the Hartford Courant’s editorial board, and newspapers across the state,” she said.

This new ad comes just four days after the campaign’s last one, which highlights Murphy’s absences from committee meetings in Congress and failure to pay his rent and mortgage.

The rapid-fire onslaught of attacks is evidence of the well-funded, well-managed U.S. Senate campaign McMahon is running this year, which has helped her post a slight lead in the most recent poll, despite losing by 12 points during her last run, in 2010.

Watch the ad: