U.S. Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, told his constituents in Spencer that opponent Rob Hubler and a coalition of “”hard-core left” forces are targeting him, and making the Fifth District race “personal.”

Here is the Spencer Daily Reporter:

Following his town hall meeting in Spencer, the Kiron Republican, who is running for a fourth term vs. Democrat Rob Hubler of Council Bluffs, was asked if he might debate his opponent locally before the November general election.

“I debate every day. … So, it’s not a matter of the debate,” King replied. “It’s about whether we have a credible candidate where there really needs to be an illumination of the issues or whether it’s just simply going to be a confrontation where there are personal attacks that fall out from that. I think it has to be of the highest level of integrity. I haven’t seen that. I haven’t seen that there has been a serious policy approach. It’s been personal.

“What we do have is I have been targeted by the hard-core left, including MoveOn.org and George Soros. I have made Michael Moore’s Web page. I have made Rolling Stone’s Web site. Also, I made ‘the worst person in the world’ under Keith Olbermann. … Those people are all left-wing, hard-core activists. And they have said they’re coming here and they’re going to try to change the dynamic in this race. (Democratic campaign worker) Joe Trippi has been hired by the other side. He’s the one who raised $40 million on a Web page for (2004 Democratic presidential candidate) Howard Dean. So you will see, I think, this turn into a very negative situation in this district. And on top of that, I know that push-poll calls have gone out and they’ve already attacked my family. That’s not the way we do politics in western Iowa. It’s been above-board, it’s been clean. I have not run a negative campaign in my entire career. It’s something that I think Iowans deserve to know, where we stand on the issues. If there’s any wonder, I’ve been at this for six years. No one’s thinks I’m an equivocator and the access to me, I think, has been acceptable. It’s never enough because it’s a big district. So, I don’t know if it will get resolved with a debate, but let’s ensure that there’s a credible candidate out there that really has a disagreement on the issues. If we can have that kind of dialogue, I wouldn’t rule it out.”