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Behind the scenes, Sestak and Specter keep up the sniping

The public statements may have stopped, for now. But the vitriol continues.

In messages to supporters Monday, Senator Arlen Specter and Congressman Joe Sestak (D-7) continued to pound one another ahead of their expected Senate primary fight next year. Their attacks didn’t tread new ground, instead mostly reiterating points made in their salvos last week.

Both including fundraising appeals in their attacks.

“Running in a Democratic primary, Arlen knows he cannot win on his three decade Republican Senatorial record, where he steadfastly supported the Republican agenda, including the last eight years of the failed Bush Presidency,” Sestak wrote. “Instead, Arlen has decided his only shot at winning in the primary is to run a “negative campaign” against me; hence his attack on my military service and integrity.”

Specter’s campaign, meanwhile, criticized Sestak’s long tap-dance around an official announcement of his candidacy.

“Despite his continuous barrage of negative comments against Senator Specter’s record, Sestak has still declined to say that he is definitively a candidate for the U.S. Senate,” the campaign wrote. “First he stated that he needed to discuss it with his family. He then said that he got the go-ahead from his wife, but he still had to talk to his eight-year-old daughter. Though an early July news article cited Sestak as saying he was running against Senator Specter, his staff quickly retracted it, stating that it was a mistake. More recently Sestak has said it will be several months before a final decision is made. Sestak can’t make up his mind whether or not he’s actually running for Senate.”

July 14, 2009 at 6:56 am

--Dan Hirschhorn

Tags: Arlen Specter, Joe Sestak

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