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John Hollenhorst ReportingPaul Neuenschwander, (R) Candidate For State Representative: "You just realize that you can just do your best effort and let the voters decide.
Down to the wire, all over the state candidates made a final push today to get their message out to the voters, and in the contentious race for Salt Lake County Sheriff, incumbent Aaron Kennard is taking responsibility for a last-minute campaign attack involving a heavily edited video of his opponent.
Sheriff Aaron Kennard, S.L. County: "If it came from my camp, the buck stops with me."
While Kennard is taking responsibility for the ad, he also is saying he had nothing to do with it. Now the question is, did the negative attack hit its target or backfire on the Sheriff's campaign?
Sheriff Kennard's campaign had a scare last week when poll results showed him well behind challenger Jim Winder. That prompted a Sunday counterattack orchestrated by a man who works for the sheriff, but Kennard insists he knew nothing about it until today.
Jeff Jamison works for the sheriff's department as a media specialist. He's also a consultant for Sheriff Kennard's campaign against Jim Winder.
Jeff Jamison, Sheriff's Office: "He's been taking all the slander and the slamming from Winder all this time, and now that we just saw the new numbers that came out, personally I just couldn't let Winder get away with it any more."
Jamison admits he released a video Sunday without asking the sheriff's permission.
Jeff Jamison: "I thought, he wants to keep it clean, but when we found out what the numbers were, I knew he wouldn't go for it. And I took it upon myself."
Video shows clips of Winder training deputies. He uses vulgar language, criticizes other agencies, and sounds like he might enjoy shooting someone. Winder says out-of-context editing distorted his remarks.
Jim Winder, Candidate for Sheriff: "My reputation speaks for itself. I'm a person who believes in improving law enforcement, who has no history of abusive or problematic behavior. There are six hours of video that demonstrate the same exact things that were in the small clips."
The sheriff insists he opposes negative campaigning.
Aaron Kennard, S.L. County Sheriff: "If it came from my camp, the buck stops with me."
Q: "Do you think it was the right thing to do, to bring it out?"
A: "Well if I'd had my choice, not at this late time. But I didn't know about it."
However, he says the video may be worthy of attention.
Aaron Kennard: "If indeed he's been training for the last year or two, this type of training, that's very disturbing."
Jim Winder: "This, at the end of the day, is a fairly desperate attempt, a last-minute attempt to paint me in a unfavorable light."
The sheriff says anyone is welcome to view the unedited training tapes themselves, but since they run six hours, it's unlikely voters have the time before election day.
