Campaign fliers get nastier in Stevens-Walser race

OLYMPIA — Campaign mailers are starting to read a lot nastier in the race between state Sen. Val Stevens and challenger Fred Walser.

Voters in the 39th Legislative District in eastern Snohomish County received two fliers in recent days saying Arlington’s incumbent Republican senator holds “extreme views,” blaring in large print comments she made in a hearing on a survey of incidence of domestic violence.

“I don’t want to confuse the domestic violence issue with women who, excuse me gentlemen, have PMS. … I know there are times when women can get out of control,” are Stevens’ words excerpted on fliers sent by a political action committee, Better Future for Washington.

Stevens received the two mailers at her home.

“It would be unsettling if they told the truth. But there is nothing in there that is true so you just shrug it off,” she said Tuesday, saying the fliers are outside “the realm of dignified campaigning.”

Walser had no involvement in creating the mailers but didn’t object to their content.

“I’m OK with them, absolutely. In my opinion, those statements are accurate,” he said.

He welcomed the mailers given the hit he took in a flier sent out by the state Republican Party before the Aug. 19 primary.

It had a photo illustration of Walser behind jail bars, a reference to his conviction this year of a misdemeanor for lying to a public official while employed as Sultan’s police chief. The GOP flier had in bold print how this time voters knew a politician was corrupt before he got into office.

“I was highly offended by the Republican Party ad that wasn’t even accurate,” Walser said.

Chris Nandor, chairman of the legislative district’s Republican operation, has tracked Walser’s case closer than anyone and put everything up on a Web site. He said none of what he’s posted — or what the state party sent out — has been questioned.

“No one’s accused us of misrepresentation,” he said.

But the mailers against Stevens are another story.

“This latest one is out of left field. It’s just one of the most despicable political ads I’ve seen,” he said.

Better Future for Washington, a political action committee formed in late August, is behind the politically heated literature directed at Stevens and spent $41,272 to produce them.

The group operates independently of candidates and political parties and works to elect Democrats to the Legislature, said executive director Shakti Hawkins.

Both mail pieces focus on Stevens’ comments in a Jan. 24 Senate hearing regarding a phone survey on the incidence of domestic violence.

Stevens said she asked about the methodology to understand how information was gathered. A video of the hearing is available online.

“I don’t want to bring in domestic violence as some woman feels like she’s being abused at home at some point in time. We can all say that we’ve been abused at home at some point in time, whatever that means,” she said in the video.

Hawkins said Stevens’ statements show that she thinks women might claim to be victims if they had a bad day or suffered PMS.

“I don’t get the sense she thinks domestic violence is an important issue based on what she said in the hearing,” Hawkins said.

Stevens said she was not inferring that at all. She wanted to ensure the survey had been conducted to get the most accurate results.

“This whole thing is silliness,” she said.

Hawkins’ group is funded with $100,000 from the Roosevelt Fund, a political action committee controlled by the Senate Democratic caucus.

Sen. Karen Keiser, D-Kent, chairwoman of the Senate Democratic Campaign Committee, the caucus’s political arm, said she knew of the contribution but had no role in the fliers.

She had not seen the mailers Tuesday but said criticizing Stevens is fair game in an election. What Republicans did to Walser was not.

“There’s a bright line between personal attack and political speech,” she said. “I thought that (Republican piece) was a personal attack and totally a misrepresentation. Telling the public that someone’s political opinions are extreme is not a personal attack.”

Walser said things are heating up.

Stevens, who won 59 percent of the primary vote, said she’s not sure how she’ll respond to the mailers.

“Stay tuned,” she said.

Reporter Jerry Cornfield: 360-352-8623 or jcornfield@heraldnet.com.