Former senator accuses Rowden of ‘lying’ in attack ad against Baker
COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)
Former Democratic U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill accused state Sen. Caleb Rowden of lying in an attack ad against his election opponent Thursday.
Rowden's campaign responded by defending its use of McCaskill's work while she was state auditor against Judy Baker.
Rowden, a Republican representing Cooper and Boone counties in the state Senate, is seeking his second term against Democrat Baker. Baker is a former House member and became an administrator at University Physicians in 2001.
McCaskill's office in an audit of the University of Missouri Health System found that University Physicians lost $2 million because of billing practices from 1999 to 2001. Rowden's campaign is using those audit findings to say Baker was a poor steward of taxpayer money.
McCaskill told reporters Thursday outside the Boone County Courthouse that Baker was brought in near the end of the audit period.
"She was hired to fix the problem," McCaskill said of Baker. "She didn’t cause the problem."
McCaskill told reporters that Rowden was "lying" in the TV ad and mailers on the subject.
"He uses my image in those ads," McCaskill said. "He’s used my image in his direct mail pieces. And he’s lying in those ads, about me and about Judy Baker."
Rowden's campaign responded by saying it stands by McCaskill's work as state auditor.
"Partisanship can’t stand in the way of facts," Rowden said in a statement. "I understand the statements Claire McCaskill made as Auditor are inconvenient today to her political preference. However, her statements were factual then and they are factual now."
In a statement to media Rowden's campaign highlighted Baker's resume saying she held leadership roles at MU Health from 1998 to 2002. The statement also referred to McCaskill's work as a commentator on MSNBC as evidence of her partisanship.
McCaskill said Thursday that Baker had no role with University Physicians for seven months of the audit period.
The audit has been used against Baker in a campaign before.
Blaine Luetkemeyer brought up the audit in their 2008 race for U.S. House of Representatives. McCaskill defended Baker on the campaign trail, saying Baker "had nothing to do with those [billing] systems being set up at the hospital."
