Nancy Beasley’s “phone first” campaigning has two Democratic County chairmen tightfisted and calling for the removal of two Beasley campaign workers involved in the “negative” phone bank—which Beasley denies ever happened.

Gene Sparrow, DeKalb County Democratic chairman, and LaSalle County chairman John Balestri sent identical letters to Beasley on Oct. 17 requesting that Republican campaign manager Kelly Turner and campaign consultant Art Hanlon be dismissed from the Beasley campaign.

“These outsiders have designed phone calls to make voters believe that the negative message comes from an impartial source, when in fact, the phone message is sponsored by the Committee to Elect a Republican Senate,” Sparrow said.

The phone calls reportedly began with polling questions about Sen. Patrick Welch (D-Peru) and then progressed into a series of negative statements about Welch when the voter claimed to be a Welch supporter. At no time during the call is the caller identified as an affiliate with the Beasley campaign.

Beasley said she has not received the letter, but was read a copy of it over the phone.

“The letter has a great big lie in the middle of it. It has my people admitting to negative campaigning. There has been no negative campaigning from the Beasley campaign,” she said.

“We are requesting that Beasley be straightforward and honest with the voters,” Balestri said.

“If she is not willing to dismiss those running her negative campaign, then she should at least be signing her name to what they’re doing,” he said.

The Beasley campaign accused Welch of ignoring the issues, while the Welch campaign continues to scold Beasley for “negative” campaigning and distorting the facts.

“Each and every issue brought up in this campaign has been documented to the press,” Turner said. “Welch chooses to ignore his record and evade Nancy’s challenges with the hope of redirecting the media’s attention to the style of Beasley’s campaign.”