Erica Smith upset after TV ad supports her campaign for U.S. Senate

RALEIGH, N.C. (WTVD) -- A Controversy is swirling around a political TV ad that supports Erica Smith in her campaign to represent North Carolina in the U.S. Senate.

The ad is running on ABC11 and other stations across North Carolina.

Smith is a state senator running against Cal Cunningham in the March 3 Democratic primary.

The ad is not produced by the Smith campaign.

She says a Political Action Committee backed by Republicans, called Faith and Power, is spending $1.2 million on the ads.

"The Erica for U.S. campaign disavows and disassociates ourselves from the interference of Republicans in the Democratic Senate Primary," Smith's campaign said in a statement. "This entity is not authorized to represent our views and positions."

Cunningham also weighed in saying: "Washington Republicans know Senator Tillis is weak, and apparently they don't like his chances against me in November. Now they're resorting to shady tactics to meddle in our election -- and it's disrespectful to North Carolina voters."

The Tillis campaign tells ABC11 it did not know about the PAC until this week.

"The outrage from North Carolina Democrats over a positive ad buy for one of their candidates is curious considering they didn't seem to have a problem with Harry Reid spending millions on attack ads against Senator Tillis during his 2014 primary," said Andrew Romeo, Communications Director for the Tillis campaign in a statement to ABC11. "The Tillis campaign only heard of this outside group as of this week when their buy became public, and couldn't be the least bit concerned with which radical liberal emerges from the chaos that is the Democratic primary."