Kerry invokes Rove in e-mail to drum up campaign donations

By Mark Arsenault, Globe Staff

WASHINGTON -- Looking to goose campaign donations from Democrats, Massachusetts Senator John Kerry in a new fund-raising email invokes the name of Karl Rove, the former White House political strategist for President George W. Bush and a founder of a new political advocacy group, American Crossroads.

In his letter, Kerry warns that Rove’s “smear factory” has recent spent $500,000 on TV ads in key US Senate races.

“Rove and a group of secret donors are building a $50 million war chest to finance what they call - get this! – ‘hard-hitting issue advocacy.’ ” Kerry writes. “That sounds like a fancy way of saying they'll be doing to good people like [Democratic US Senators] Russ Feingold and Barbara Boxer what they did to me in 2004: lie, smear, distort, and deceive. Remember those ads? I sure do - and now it's my friends who are in the crosshairs.”

Kerry urges Democrats to donate $5 or more to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, which is dedicated to protecting incumbents and electing Democrats to the Senate.

In response, Jonathan Collegio, communications director for American Crossroads, said Kerry was “drumming up fear” because the Democratic Party has no alternative before the voters make their choices. “Even core Democratic voters are questioning the fiscally reckless approach the party has taken in the last two years – starting multi-trillion dollar entitlements on top of trillion dollar deficits,” said Collegio.