UPDATE: But it looks like the Lunsford campaign might be blaming Fischer for mistakes made by one or more TV stations, including WHAS-TV. First, here's the release from the Lunsford folks, then stick around to read the "rest of the story" as Paul Harvey would say. Lunsford's folks also misspelled Fischer's name at least once in their release:.

Fischer Misleads U.S. Department of Justice

Campaign ad that violated policy continued to run after they told DOJ it had stopped

LOUISVILLE - Further evidence of Greg Fischer's disregard for truth in campaigning has surfaced.

On April 25th, Greg Fisher's campaign for U.S. Senate released an attack ad containing false and misleading claims about Bruce Lunsford's business record. In the same ad, the Fischer campaign inserted an image of the Department of Justice's official seal into the ad three times in an apparent effort to give voters the impression that the Department had endorsed the advertisement. At the least, this is a violation of the Department's policy against the misuse of the official seal. At the worst, it could violate federal law and be punishable up to five years in prison.

When the Department of Justice became aware of the violation and requested the Fischer campaign "cease using the Department seal in their campaign ads," the campaign publicly refused to stop airing the ad. Behind the scenes, however, the Fischer campaign told the Department of Justice they had "ceased using the Department seal."

The statements made to the Department of Justice turned out to be another example of the campaign's propensity for false and misleading statements. In truth, the campaign disobeyed a direct request from federal authorities and continued to run the ad, which still displayed the Department of Justice seal, in several markets until as recently as Friday of last week.

Below is a factual timeline of events regarding this matter. Documents supporting this timeline are attached. Additional materials can be provided, including a capture of the ad in question on WHAS-11's noon news on Friday, May 9th.

April 25 - Fischer campaign begins airing ad containing the DOJ copyright violation.
April 30 - Attorneys for Friends of Bruce Lunsford send a letter to Assistant Attorney General for Administration, DOJ, Lee J. Lofthus, informing the Department of the Fischer campaign's use of the DOJ seal in the ad. [Sandler, Reiff & Young letter, 4/30/08]
April 30 - Fischer campaign consultant Kim Geveden tells Ryan Alessi of the Herald-Leader, that the campaign had not yet been contacted by the DOJ but will continue running the ads anyway. "The ad is going to run its course," he said. The next day, Alessi publishes a story in the Herald-Leader that also confirmed the Fischer campaign did not seek permission to use the seal and the DOJ would "request that [the campaign] cease from using the seal." [Herald-Leader Polwatchers, 4/30/08; Herald-Leader, 5/1/08]
May 1 - The DOJ contacts the Fischer campaign and tells them to "cease using the Department seal in their campaign ads." [Department of Justice letter, 5/8/08]
May 2 - The DOJ receives notification that the campaign had "ceased using the Department seal." [Department of Justice letter, 5/8/08]
May 9 - The ad, which still displayed the DOJ seal, airs through May 2nd in each Kentucky media market it started and continues on to May 9th in at least two media markets.
May 9 - Attorneys for Friends of Bruce Lunsford send a follow-up letter to the Office of General Counsel, Justice Management Division, informing them the Fischer ad continues to run. [Sandler, Reiff and Young letter, 5/9/08]

REST OF UPDATE: The only station cited in this release is WHAS-TV which did receive notice from Fischer's camp that they wished to quit running the TV ad with the Justice Department seal in it. WHAS-TV's sales folks are checking to see if the ad in question mistakenly aired after Fischer requested that it be pulled from the air. In other words, the TV station made have made a mistake, not Fischer.

No matter what happened, Fischer's campaign consultant, Kim Geveden says "it's sad that Bruce Lunsford has to go crying to George Bush's Justice Department" about some ads that Fischer is running against Lunsford.