A top Mitt Romney campaign adviser on Friday disavowed conspiracy theories pushed by Donald Trump, one of Romney's most high-profile supporters. The adviser said the campaign could not be held responsible for everything that Romney supporters say.

Trump is a birther. He clings to the notion that President Barack Obama was born in Kenya, not the United States, despite the fact that this theory has been proven to be baseless.

Next week, Romney will be holding an event with Trump. In a CNN interview on Friday, Romney aide Eric Fehrnstrom said the campaign was going ahead with the May 29 event despite Trump's birther views. He said the presumptive GOP nominee should not be held responsible for the opinions of his supporters:

FEHRNSTROM: I can't speak for Donald Trump, Gloria, but I can tell you that Mitt Romney accepts that President Obama was born in the United States. He doesn't view the place of his birth as an issue in this campaign. We have many serious challenges facing this country dealing with jobs in the economy. That's where we should center our discussion. And as I said, you know, Mitt Romney has made it clear that this is not an issue for him.

CNN HOST GLORIA BORGER: So why is Mitt Romney sort of throwing a party with Donald Trump to raise money?

FEHRNSTROM: Well, you know, not too long ago, Jay Carney, the spokesman for the White House, made a statement which I think is correct. That statement was that a candidate can't be responsible for everything that their supporters say. And in this case, Mitt Romney has made it clear that the place of the president's birth is not an issue for him. He accepts the fact that he was born in Hawaii. And we have many important challenges facing our country, and that's what we'd rather talk about.

Carney made that statement because the Romney campaign was trying to tie Obama to a comment made by one of the president's supporters. When Democratic strategist Hilary Rosen (who, in full disclosure, was once employed at this website) made controversial comments about stay-at-home mothers, Fehrnstrom quickly tried to link her to the president, calling her an "Obama adviser." Rosen, however, was employed neither by the Obama campaign nor by the Democratic National Committee.

An anti-Obama group hopes to use the president's deportation record to pull away his Hispanic support, beginning in a campaign in Nevada next week.

The "Vote Your Values" effort will be launched on Wednesday, May 30. It will not back a specific candidate, but goes directly against Obama for his record on immigration.

"Latinos have latched onto President Obama's failed promises of fixing immigration and jumpstarting job creation," Alfonso Aguilar, executive director of Latino Partnership for Conservative Principles, said in a statement Thursday. "Instead of advocating for Hispanics, his administration has deported more immigrants than any other president in the modern era, through a policy of massive and systematic deportations that is much more punitive than the Arizona law."

The group will spend up to $1 million from donors on "education" about immigration, social conservatism and free enterprise, CBS News reported on Friday.

Aguilar told CBS News that Obama is "worse than Joe Arpaio" on immigration, referring to the Arizona sheriff who has been sued for alleged civil rights violations.

Some Republicans aim to use deportation records to lower approval for Obama from Latinos, who overwhelmingly supported him in 2008. The administration deported a record number of people in the 2011 fiscal year and failed to pass any type of immigration reform. It could be a weak point: Nearly 60 percent of Latino voters disapprove of Obama's handling of immigration enforcement, according to a December 2011 study by the Pew Hispanic Center.

Still, Romney would need to make up a substantial amount of ground to win among Hispanic voters. A poll out this week from NBC News, the Wall Street Journal and Telemundo puts him 34 percentage points behind Obama with Latinos.

Groups from the other side, such as the liberal PAC+, are touting the opposite message: That Romney is too extreme on immigration. (Romney has called for more undocumented immigrants to leave the country, not fewer -- making the argument that Obama should be opposed for deporting too many somewhat confusing.)

The super PAC launched television ads in Arizona on Thursday tying Romney to Arizona Republicans Gov. Jan Brewer and Arpaio.

Mitt Romney is bringing in the Donald for fundraising.

The former Massachusetts governor is offering those who donate at least $3 a chance in a raffle, with the prize being a meal with Romney and the real estate mogul who endorsed him.

The winners also will have the opportunity to stay at Trump's hotel in New York and tour the "Celebrity Apprentice" boardroom.

Trump beat the drum for President Barack Obama to release his birth certificate. Following the public release of Obama's long-form document, Trump has continued to voice doubts about it.

And Trump has disagreed with Mitt Romney over the spartan Paul Ryan budget plan, with the presumptive GOP nominee praising it and Trump calling it a "disaster." Trump elaborated on his criticism on Thursday in an interview with conservative outlet Newsmax, claiming it's "very dangerous for the Republicans." Trump cited the 2011 special election of Kathy Hochul (D-N.Y.), who won in a Republican-dominated district by hammering her opponent over the plan.

Romney isn't the only one to offer donors a chance to chow down with a celebrity. President Barack Obama's campaign has offered the chance for donors to dine with Sarah Jessica Parker and George Clooney.

Trump is also appearing with Newt Gingrich at a May 29 Romney fundraiser at the Trump Towers in Las Vegas. It wasn't immediately clear whether the three would offer a donor the chance to dine together at a buffet.

Mike Gravel, that rare presidential candidate who famously stared down viewers before throwing a rock into a pond in a 2007 campaign ad, has finally been outdone.

In a nearly 5-minute-long web ad, Jeff Barth, the Democratic commissioner of Minnehaha County and Democratic opponent to Republican Rep. Kristi Noem of South Dakota, wanders into a forest, and, as fiddle music plays, proceeds to explain why D.C. insiders are a bunch of “horse's asses.”

Barth also happens to don a hard hat, gesticulate aggressively with a newspaper and fire a loaded weapon, all while he berates “those idiots running things” in Washington who "do whatever the hell they want.” He even works in an anecdote about the time he rode an ostrich and casually mentions that his daughters have husbands and straight teeth.

Mother Jones reporter Tim Murphy has hailed it on Twitter as "the campaign ad we've been waiting for," while MSNBC's Jamil Smith questions whether we should view this as sarcasm or, more likely, as a profound and absurd deconstruction of the art of the political campaign ad.

WATCH IT:

When a Tucson, Ariz., TV journalist tried to ask GOP congressional candidate Jesse Kelly about a controversial endorsement he has received, she unexpectedly found herself verbally harangued by his spokesman both during and after the interview on Wednesday.

At issue was Kelly's acceptance of an endorsement by a controversial anti-immigration group in 2010.

Americans for Legal Immigration PAC (ALIPAC) is run by William Gheen, who says on the group's website, "The rallying cry is: Illegals Go Home!' No corporate propaganda will change the fact that most Americans do not want to surrender or capitulate to the lawless masses rushing into our nation."

According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, ALIPAC is "supported" by a designated hate group and "allied with various Minuteman factions." The Anti-Defamation League has also pointed out ALIPAC's support from white supremacists and anti-Semites.

KGUN9-TV's Jennifer Waddell sat down for an interview with Kelly, and attempted to ask him a question from one of the station's viewers about the endorsement. She was quickly interrupted, off-camera, by Kelly's spokesman John Ellinwood:

Waddell: We have something from one of our viewers again. This is Joe Evano: "Recently you accepted the endorsement of the Americans for Legal Immigration group. Senator John McCain and the Anti-Defamation League have denounced --

Ellinwood: (off camera, interrupting): I want to stop you.

Waddell: Oh --

Ellinwood: That's false.

Waddell: Okay --

Ellinwood: He did not accept recently.

Waddell: This is --

Ellinwood (interrupting): No. It's false. That was from 2010. So would you please read some correct answers?

Waddell: Well, this is not an "answer." This is something --

Ellinwood (interrupting): That was not recent.

Kelly then calmly held up his hand and allowed Waddell to continue. She asked him, "Why then did you accept that endorsement?"

"It was in 2010. This election is about jobs, and the economy and lower gas prices. Frankly it's completely out of bounds," he responded, dodging the question.

But according to Waddell, after the interview wrapped up, Ellinwood "continued his verbal attack through the hallways and in the front lobbies of our studios." He used the words "trash" and "sleaze" to characterize the viewer's question, saying Waddell should never have asked it.

Ellinwood later called KGUN9 news director Forrest Carr and demanded to know whether there would be "incendiary 'gotcha' language" in another interview the network was going to do at 3 p.m, KGUN wrote in its report. When Carr stood by the viewer question Waddell posed, Ellinwood canceled the appearance.

"If you're a journalist in Tucson and you dare to ask that question, be prepared to have angry fingers jabbed in your face, your professionalism impugned, and interviews canceled," KGUN9 wrote.

While ALIPAC did first endorse Kelly in 2010, it also renewed its endorsement of the Arizona candidate last week -- in other words, "recently."

Kelly is running against Democrat Ron Barber for the open seat being vacated by Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.). Barber is a former aide to the congresswoman.

Watch Wadell's full report here, and a clip of the interview below:

President Barack Obama holds a narrow lead over presumptive Republican nominee Mitt Romney in three pivotal battleground states -- Florida, Ohio and Virginia -- according to an NBC-Marist poll released on Thursday. The Florida results come in stark contrast to a a Quinnipiac University poll on Wednesday, which showed Romney ahead by six points, and are indicative of how much polling can fluctuate in a closely contested race.

According to the NBC-Marist poll, the president is ahead by an identical four-point margin in Florida and Virginia, leading Romney 48 percent to 44 percent among registered voters. In Ohio, Obama holds a six-point edge, leading Romney 48 percent to 42 percent. But the president's advantage is substantially lower than that in an earlier round of NBC-Marist polls conducted in March, which placed him ahead of Romney by 12 percentage points in Ohio and 17 points in Virginia.

As NBC points out, the president is hurt by public sentiment that the country is on the wrong track. At least 55 percent of respondents in all three states said the country is going the wrong way, but they were less sure which of the two candidates will do a better job steering the economy.

Reality television star, real estate mogul and Republican celebrity du jour Donald Trump told the conservative news site NewsMax that he was considering launching his own super PAC to extend his political influence.

When asked whether established super PACs had approached him to fund attacks on President Barack Obama, Trump responded, "Yes, they have, and I am thinking about just doing my own super PAC."

"There was a recent [anti-Obama] commercial done where they made him look like a superhero. I'm saying, who made this commercial? I thought it was one of the worst commercials I've ever seen," Trump explained. "If I did one, I would show how bad we're doing as a country, how disrespected we are as a country. I would show people from OPEC, 11 people sitting around a beautiful gold-encrusted table talking about how they are going to continue to rip off the United States."

Trump elaborated on other ad ideas: "I would do one on China and talk about the manipulation of their currency, which is draining the blood out of this country ... My super PAC ads would be focused on how outside places and outside things are absolutely sucking the blood out of this country, and this country can't be great again unless it really starts to generate money. You can't fund Medicare, you can't fund Social Security unless we start to generate money, and we can't because outside sources are taking our money. We're like children with a wallet, and they're just taking the money right out of our wallet."

Were Trump to start up his own super PAC, it would not be the first time he helped fund one of those unlimited-money political committees created in the wake of two court decisions, most prominently the Supreme Court's January 2010 ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. In 2010, Trump donated $50,000 to the Karl Rove-linked super PAC American Crossroads.

A left-leaning super PAC is aiming to broaden Mitt Romney's struggle with Latino voters in a television ad buy in Arizona that ties the candidate to Sheriff Joe Arpaio and Gov. Jan Brewer (R), who are widely disliked in the Arizona Latino community.

"We want to draw attention to the political significance of the state," Julie Martinez Ortega, president of PAC+, told the Los Angeles Times. Arizona "has taken on a level of symbolic importance for a lot of people, whether they're Latino or not, who see the protection of civil rights as an important part of an inclusive America."

In the ad, the group's first in Arizona, a Latino man in a suit walks out of a building holding a box of work supplies -- presumably after losing his job -- and watches a clip of Romney saying "no skill, no education, and are looking for a free meal," with text that reads "What Romney thinks of us." It then shows Arpaio and Brewer praising the former Massachusetts governor.

Watch the English-language ad below or the Spanish-language ad on the group's website.

The ad doesn't specifically say what makes Arpaio and Brewer troubling allies for Romney, but the two politicians are hated enough in the Arizona Latino community for residents to know. Arpaio, who calls himself "America's toughest sheriff," was sued by the Justice Department earlier this month for alleged civil rights violations.

He also devoted significant time and resources to a search for President Barack Obama's birth certificate, even though the White House and others have debunked the claim that the president was born outside of the United States.

Brewer is infamous for signing S.B. 1070, the state's anti-unauthorized immigration law aimed at driving the undocumented out of the state. Critics of the law say it could lead to racial profiling of Latinos and anyone else deemed to look like an undocumented immigrant, and a majority of Hispanics in the state opposed it when it was signed into law in 2010. The Supreme Court heard a Department of Justice challenge of the law in April, but has not yet ruled on whether certain provisions are unconstitutional.

The Romney campaign has seemed to keep its distance from Arpaio, despite seeking and receiving his endorsement in 2008. This time around, the sheriff has not issued an endorsement. Brewer endorsed Romney just ahead of the Arizona Republican primary.

According to a poll out Wednesday, Romney currently lags among Latino voters, which the Obama campaign hopes will help put Arizona in play despite its tendency to go to Republicans. Although Romney's campaign and the Republican National Committee are upping efforts to reach out to Latinos, the candidate skipped over Hispanic-specific issues entirely in a speech on education to a Latino business group on Wednesday.

The Romney campaign did not respond to a request for comment on the ad. PAC+ did not immediately respond to an inquiry about the ad buy.

WASHINGTON -- Perhaps the most frightening and controversial flyer in the Wisconsin recalls is being circulated not in the high-profile gubernatorial battle, but in one of the close-fought state Senate districts.

Although they get less attention than the marquee battle between Gov. Scott Walker (R) and Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett (D), the stakes are high in Wisconsin's state Senate recall races. Four GOP incumbents are being targeted for recall in the June 5 election. Democrats need to pick up just one of these seats in order to gain back a majority in the state Senate, so both parties are spending heavily on the races.

The battle for Senate District 21 has gotten particularly heated, with independent groups sending out a slew of mailers. Democrats view incumbent state Sen. Van Wanggaard (R-Racine) as the most vulnerable. His challenger is John Lehman, a Democrat who held the seat before Wanggard beat him in 2010.

The Republican State Leadership Committee is circulating a mailer showing a man with his hand over the mouth of a woman. His face is against hers, and she is clearly terrified by the whole situation. "You're not safe," reads the mailer. "Thanks to John Lehman."

On the back, it reads, "John Lehman supported a bill that allowed dangerous criminals out of prison before their sentences were complete. Too many people have paid dearly at the hands of violent criminals. Any reasonable person would expect those criminals to get what's coming to them. But not John Lehman." The flyer also reads, in large font, "Home invasions. Theft. Homicide."

A resident of Racine, Wis. sent the mailer to The Huffington Post. The RSLC said it delivered the mailer to about 10,000 homes.

"It's the meanest mailer I've ever seen. I've seen a lot of them over the years mailed against us, but this one is kind of over the edge," Lehman said.

He pointed to the image of a hooded figure on the back of the flyer as proof of his claim.

"The whole idea of using a black hoodie on a very black background plays on recent news, and sort of has a racist overtone to it," Lehman added, referencing the shooting of Trayvon Martin, a young unarmed African-American man in Florida who was wearing a hoodie at the time of his death.

The flyer refers to former Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle's 2009 measure allowing felons to be released from prison early for good behavior or to deal with health issues. The move was intended, in part, to save the state money and cut the deficit, which totaled $6.6 billion at the time.

Wisconsin was one of 13 states to either create or expand early release programs that year, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Lehman and other Democrats backed Doyle's measure. But last year, Walker signed legislation, sponsored by Wanggaard, repealing it.

The policy was certainly controversial and even attracted criticism from Barrett. Still, the flyer is not entirely accurate.

Doyle's measure was aimed at shortening the sentences of non-violent felons.

"I've been in law enforcement my entire career," Doyle said in May 2009. "To me it makes sense to go into prison for a non-violent offense, and if they do well in prison, they take part in the programs, do the things they should do, they should earn some time off from the sentence. That makes common sense. That's what 46 other states and the federal government do."

Adam Temple, a spokesman for the RSLC, said that by protesting the flyer, Lehman was simply "distracting from his poor record on this issue."

"The point we're making with that mail piece ... is that Wisconsin Democrats released more than 500 inmates early," he said. "We're highlighting the fact that Lehman voted for that law, and Republicans have now repealed the law, making Wisconsin safer."

Temple said the RSLC based its mailer "on the fact that one of the first 22 inmates [released under the program] had a reckless homicide conviction, and numerous drug dealers were included in the total of 500 inmates released."

Indeed, Paula Harris, 55, a Milwaukee resident who was convicted of first-degree reckless homicide, was one of the first inmates released.

Yet the RSLC mailer's focus on "killers" and "violent criminals" is misleading, since the vast majority of individuals released early did not fit those categories.

Non-violent criminals could get out for a variety of reasons under the program, including good behavior. But violent criminals could be released only for age- or health-related issues. As the Wisconsin State Journal reported in March 2010, "It's theoretically possible, therefore, for an elderly murderer who had served only a portion of his sentence to be released by the Earned Release Review Commission, which has purview over age and health-related releases."

Lehman said he stood by his vote.

"To make the blatant statement that work on earned release is somehow connected directly with violent acts in a way that everyone should be fearful is just fear-mongering. It's just nasty," he said.

"One of the things that the average citizen tends to forget is that almost everyone in Wisconsin's prison system has a sentence from which they'll eventually be released. ... We need to have a good community corrections operation that keeps people safe," he added. "We need to balance the extremely high costs of Wisconsin's prisons -- compared to Minnesota, for example -- with the mandate to keep people safe. And that whole discussion being distilled down into a black hoodie and a violent act is just a travesty."

The RSLC's Democratic counterpart, the Democratic Leadership Campaign Committee, said the mailer was just "another example of Republican scare tactics."

"[T]hey are trying to deflect attention from the fact that Wisconsin, which already had the worst job creation of any state in the country, lost an additional 6,200 private sector jobs in April under Republican legislative leadership," said DLCC spokesman Daniel Roth. "Republicans can not answer to the fact that they have simply not delivered on their promise to improve the Wisconsin economy."

Wanggaard did not return a request for comment.

Click HERE to see a larger version of the RSLC mailer.

UPDATE: 12:45 p.m. -- The Racine branch of the NAACP is backing up Lehman's comments about the racial overtones of the mailer.

"The first thing that came to my mind is the hoodie and Trayvon Martin," said Gloria Rogers, head of the local organization. "It is trying to make people afraid of being around of young black males. What else could a black person think when they look at that?"

Florida Rep. Connie Mack has a sizable lead in the state's Republican primary for Senate, and he's evenly matched against incumbent Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson, a poll out Thursday says.

In spite of Tea Party insurgents complicating contests elsewhere in the country, Mack, a fourth-term member of Congress, has largely embraced the movement and has large leads on all his competitors, the Quinnipiac University poll found.

Mack is leading the Republican field with 40 percent of voters, topping the 8 percent for Tea Party-backed hopeful Mike McCalister and the 7 percent for former Sen. George LeMieux.

The survey finds that the general election contest is a statistical dead heat, with Mack netting 42 percent of support to Nelson's 41 percent.

Mack faced a residency controversy, and some members of the Tea Party have criticized him for not being conservative enough, but he's also won prominent conservative support, including the endorsement of Tea Party favorite Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.).

"Although some activists have been critical of Congressman Connie Mack and his campaign, he retains an overwhelming lead in the race for the Republican Senate nomination and is tied with Sen. Bill Nelson," said Peter Brown, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute. "It is not clear how the late entrance of former Congressman Dave Weldon into the race will affect the campaign, but Mack's lead is pretty formidable with three months until the primary."

Nelson has slipped since a March 29 Quinnipiac survey, when he led with 44 percent over Mack's 36 percent.

Mitt Romney's campaign released its second general election television ad Thursday. It is another iteration of what Romney will do on his first day in office.

Romney released his first "Day One" ad last week. The script for the second one is below, and you can watch it here:

VIDEO TEXT: What would a Romney Presidency be like?

VOICEOVER: What would a Romney Presidency be like?

VIDEO TEXT: Day 01

VOICEOVER: Day one, President Romney announces deficit reductions, ending the Obama era of big government, helping secure our kids’ futures.

VIDEO TEXT: End Obama era of Big Government

VOICEOVER: President Romney stands up to China on trade and demands they play by the rules.

VIDEO TEXT: Make China Play By The Rules

VOICEOVER: President Romney begins repealing job-killing regulations that are costing the economy billions.

VIDEO TEXT: Repeal Job-killing Regulations

VOICEOVER: That’s what a Romney presidency will be like.

MITT ROMNEY: I’m Mitt Romney and I approve this message.

The Democratic National Committee is fundraising directly for the Democratic Party of Wisconsin in an effort to aid Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett (D) in the upcoming gubernatorial election against Gov. Scott Walker (R).

"Choices don't get clearer than this," read the email sent Wednesday evening by the DNC chair, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.). "Winning in Wisconsin sends a powerful message to the far-right extremists, and it starts to roll back their worst offenses. To build our organization and make it happen, Democrats need to come together to turn out hundreds of thousands of voters -- and we all have a part to play."

What's notable about this fundraising appeal is that the money will go directly to Wisconsin Democrats, rather than to the DNC. Other national organizations -- including the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee -- have sent out solicitations related to the recall, but the money has not directly gone to Wisconsin entities.

A Democratic party official told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that Wednesday's fundraising email was being sent to "millions" of people.

"On June 5th, the people of Wisconsin will have their chance to recall Governor Scott Walker, whose attacks on workers' and women's rights are the definition of a fireable offense," Wasserman Schultz added in the email. "Democrats are rallying around our nominee, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, and with just 14 days to go before the election, we're organizing one of the largest get-out-the-vote efforts in state history."

Last week, the DNC chair phoned Barrett and pledged to host a fundraiser and provide grassroots support.

"The DNC is going to use both its substantial network of volunteers and supporters, and our online resources to help build the ground game that will be necessary to win on election day," DNC spokeswoman Melanie Roussell told The Huffington Post at the time.

President Barack Obama's campaign has also jumped in, organizing phone banks and canvassing operations to get out the vote for the June 5 election.

The Plum Line's Greg Sargent recently reported that Wisconsin Democrats felt like they weren't getting enough support from the national level and wanted the DNC to commit $500,000 to the recall.

Rep. Denny Rehberg, the Republican congressman running for U.S. Senate in Montana, has apparently become something of a poster child for boating safety. And not in a good way.

Rehberg was one of several people injured in a 2009 boating wreck when the speedboat he was riding in, which was being driven by then-state Sen. Greg Barkus, slammed into the rocky shore of a lake near Bigfork, Mont. Rehberg suffered a broken ankle and ribs, and an aide was in a coma for more than a week.

Barkus was found to have had a .16 blood-alcohol level. He pleaded no contest to a charge of felony criminal endangerment, and was sentenced early last year to a 4-year deferred prison sentence and $29,000 in fines.

The startling photo of the wreck, with the boat entirely out of the water, made most local papers. And now, it's the feature photo of a boating safety campaign in Montana. A tipster emailed the below photo to HuffPost Wednesday, snapped in a local cafe.

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story misnamed the town near the site of Rep. Rehberg's boating accident. It is Bigfork, Mont.

Former Sen. George LeMieux (R-Fla.) didn't coast to his seat in the Senate. He was appointed by former Gov. Charlie Crist (R) -- an appointment for which he campaigned ferociously. That same intensity and political savvy is on display now as he seeks to unseat incumbent Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), The Miami Herald reports.

"He really wanted to do it. So he was going to do everything he could," former Lt. Gov. Jeff Kottkamp (R) told the Herald's Adam C. Smith and Marc Caputo. "He really, really wanted to do it."

The story alleges that Crist told both Kottkamp and University of North Florida President John Delaney that they would be picked for the spot. But after LeMieux launched an aggressive campaign that included an anonymous website attacking Delaney, Crist reportedly turned his attentions to LeMieux.

It wasn't just Delaney and Kottkamp who LeMieux managed to outmaneuver. According to the Herald report, "Every time speculation would center on a perceived frontrunner, negative information or criticism of that candidate would surface, invariably fueled by allies of LeMieux."

If LeMieux was the sole brass-knuckled politician in 2009, that certainly isn't the case now. His Senate primary opponent, Rep. Connie Mack (R-Fla.), has taken the aggression charges several steps further, accusing LeMieux of pressuring Crist for the job improperly and even resorting to "bribery," claims for which there has been no evidence.

Mack's attacks are part of a larger campaign strategy to paint LeMieux as overly liberal by highlighting his ties to Crist, who became a Republican pariah after he left the party in 2010 to run as an independent against Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.).

“The day after he [Crist] left the party, I endorsed Marco Rubio,” LeMieux said, according to the Orlando Sentinel.

10 more election stories from beyond the presidential field:

Tea Party-Backed Thomas Massie Wins House Primary In Kentucky [The Courier-Journal]

Centrist Republicans Could Help End Partisan Gridlock In California [The Los Angeles Times]

House Race In California Attracts Unprecedented Outside Spending [The Press-Enterprise]

Julius Melendez Wins Republican Straw Poll In Florida [Orlando Sentinel]

Jamie Radtke: George Allen A 'Risky Choice' For Virginia [Richmond Republican Examiner]

Maine Republican Senate Candidate: 'I'm Not All That Easy To Push Around' [The Morning Sentinel]

Club For Growth Says Hatch Likely To Win In Utah [Utah Policy]

Candidates For Giffords' Seat Face Off In Debate [Green Valley News And Sun]

Victor In House Republican Primary In Arkansas Wanted Journos Jailed [MoJo]

John Mellencamp's 'R.O.C.K. In The USA' Adopted By Tammy Duckworth In Illinois House Race [NBC Chicago]