National GOP group cancels $1 million in Nethercutt ads

By Jim Brunner and Alex Fryer
Seattle Times staff reporters

E-mail this article Print this article Search archive Most read articles Most e-mailed articles

Advertising representatives at Seattle network affiliates KING, KIRO and KOMO confirmed that the committee this week canceled all the time it had reserved for ads between next week and Election Day.

Dan Allen, NRSC spokesman, said, "it doesn't mean we can't do it in the future. We're assessing on a daily basis the entire playing field. We know he [Nethercutt] is a running a very aggressive campaign."

The committee had reserved about $865,000 worth of advertising at KING and $300,000 at KOMO. An advertising representative at KIRO confirmed the ads on that station also had been canceled but did not provide a total dollar amount yesterday afternoon.

Randa Minkarah, general sales manager at KOMO, said the station was not given any reason for the cancellation. She said the campaign could return and purchase time later, though rates could get more expensive as Election Day approaches. The NRSC only scheduled the time about a week ago before dropping it this week, she said.

Sen. George Allen, R-Va., who chairs the committee, has repeatedly called Nethercutt, a Spokane congressman, a strong candidate and has campaigned on his behalf.

But several recent polls have shown Democratic Sen. Patty Murray maintaining a lead of from 7 to 19 percentage points over Nethercutt.

Meanwhile, several other Senate races around the country have grown extremely tight. Polls show Senate races in Colorado, Oklahoma, Alaska, South Dakota and Florida essentially tied, according to National Journal, a Washington, D.C.-based political magazine.

The NRSC is helping Nethercutt pay for a new ad to be unveiled today in Washington, D.C. That ad is part of the committee's so-called coordinated expenditures, which are made in consultation with the Nethercutt campaign. Allen said the NRSC has committed to up to $690,000 worth of those expenditures, the maximum allowed in Washington under federal law.

The committee could spend a lot more than that on independent expenditures, which it cannot discuss with the Nethercutt campaign. The ad time that was canceled would have fallen under the independent-expenditure category, Allen said.

Nethercutt campaign spokesman Alex Conant downplayed the NRSC move. "It doesn't mean anything," he said.
 
Conant said Nethercutt has never counted on independent expenditures and had raised enough money — $5.4 million as of the last Federal Election Commission report — to be competitive with Murray, who had raised $10.7 million.

Jim Brunner: 206-515-5628 or jbrunner@seattletimes.com Alex Fryer: 202-662-7456 or afryer@seattletimes.com