South Dakota Senator Tim Johnson's campaign calls the latest television ad by his challenger; false, deceitful, and a desperate trick. 

Joel Dykstra, who trails Johnson in the polls by almost 2-1, went on the attack this week airing a commercial that blames Johnson for the country's financial mess. 

"Tim Johnson is the number 2 man on the senate banking committee" 

It's this television ad, that has the Johnson campaign all fired up. 

"It's unfortunately not true," said Steve Jarding, Johnson's campaign manager. 

Jarding says Dykstra is trying to confuse and mislead voters. 

"He's a desperate candidate in a desperate campaign and it's unfortunate, but some of the claims he makes in it he can not justify," said Jarding. 

"Tim Johnson took $61-thousand dollars in contributions from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, but voted against tougher oversight."

Jarding says that's not true. 

"Over the 22 year career Tim has gotten 20-thousand dollars in contributions from Freddie and Fannie that amounts to .10 of one percent of all contributions he's taken," said Jarding. 

The ad also claims Johnson voted against regulating the banking industry. But Jarding says Johnson not only voted for more oversight, but also wrote a letter to the treasury department in 2003 asking for it. 

"With all do respect, Joel Dykstra is being very hypocritical and not coming clean with voters of South Dakota, because his ads somehow suggest Tim did something for those industries, when in fact he voted against the biggest bill they ever had," said Jarding. 

That bill was the $700 billion dollar bailout. 

Dykstra was out of town, but told KELOLAND NEWS over the phone, he stands by his ad and says Jarding is the one who is manipulating the contribution numbers.  Dykstra says if you figure in what employees and managers from Freddie and Fannie contributed, the figure is $61-thousand dollars. If you'd like to look at the contributions for yourself click here.