On the second day of being the DFL gubernatorial standard-bearer, Mark Dayton held a press conference and made news. His first comment was to call on all outside third-party interest groups to stop negative personal attacks. “Let’s have a clean positive campaign” he said. This comes the same day a Republican Party ad starts running that attacks Dayton for “erratic” behavior in the U.S. Senate.
Republicans said “it’s rich and hypocritical” for Dayton to call for a cease fire when his family members have funded ads attacking GOP nominee Tom Emmer. Dayton went after the Democratic leaning Alliance for a Better Minnesota’s ads on Emmer’s DWIs saying “it crossed the line.” Reporters remember with Norm Coleman put out the same call for to stop third-party attacks and it didn’t work. Dayton also said he’ll start hitting the phones because “I need to raise money to run my next ad” although when pressed he added he “could run an ad if I needed to” with his own money.
