Komen for the Cure says it is not connected to Glouco campaign ad of cancer patient

A campaign ad mailed out to criticize two candidates running for the Gloucester County freeholder board displays a photograph of a cancer victim and a grim statistic about cancer deaths.

Its source, the ad says, is the website for Susan G. Komen for the Cure, a nonprofit organization that raises funds for breast cancer education and research.

But a Komen official says the organization did not provide the photograph of the bald female cancer patient and does not endorse any political party or candidate.

The statistic, that "every 69 seconds a woman dies of breast cancer," is accurate, he said.

"We can't see using the issue as a political football because breast cancer affects the right as well as the left," said Sean Tuffnell, senior communications adviser for public policy at the group's national office.

"This is the starkest one I've seen this year," Tuffnell said after reviewing the ad, and then sighed. "But that's politics."

The ad says GOP freeholder candidates Larry Wallace and Vincent Nestore are allied with "Republican cronies in Trenton" who have "cut lifesaving cancer screening programs."

Wallace, who lost a 9-year-old son to brain cancer, and Nestore, whose 19-year-old fiancee died of leukemia, are appalled at what they call a "despicable and disgusting" ad. They say the ad implies they don't care about cancer victims, yet they have nothing to do with the state budget cuts that this summer reduced funding for women's health clinics and other programs.

Wallace said that had he been a state legislator, he would have voted to retain funding for cancer screening.

A second mailer sent this week depicts mammogram equipment and again links the GOP freeholder candidates to "Trenton Republicans" who voted for the cuts.

Democratic candidates Heather Simmons and Robert Zimmerman have said in published reports that they reviewed their campaign literature before it was mailed, but they did not mean for it to be personal.

Neither candidate has returned calls from The Inquirer.

Zimmerman told the Courier-Post that he was unaware that Wallace and Nestore had lost loved ones to cancer and apologized. "It's strictly about the issue," he said.

Simmons was quoted as saying the ad was fair because women should be concerned when cancer screening funds are cut, and candidates should take a position on the cuts.

Wallace, however, said that his opponents should have known that his son succumbed to cancer because he had attended several freeholder meetings in 2007 to publicly oppose the Mullica Hill Bypass when the road took a portion of the cemetery where his son is buried.

The two Republicans decided this week to cancel a scheduled debate for Thursday with the Democrats because the ad had triggered painful memories, and they no longer wanted "to share a stage" with their opponents.