Oregon Public Broadcasting

It's July and there are lots of fireworks going off. But in Washington State it's not just bottle rockets and firecrackers.

There are also a lot of political fireworks. Independent ad campaigns have launched on both sides of the gubernatorial race. Olympia correspondent Austin Jenkins reports.

Labor Day is the traditional start of the political season. It's still eight weeks away. But you wouldn't know it by turning on the TV or radio.

Interest groups on the left and right are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on political spots.

Anti-Gregoire ad: "When Christine Gregoire approved a gambling expansion for tribal casinos, she vetoed a deal worth up to $140 million she could have used for children's healthcare and education."

This TV ad and others like it are paid for by a political action committee called Time for a Change. If you follow the money it leads to the Building Industry Association of Washington.

Then there are anti-Rossi ads like this one.

Anti-Rossi ad: "What do you know about Republican Dino Rossi? State Senator Rossi wrote a budget that eliminated healthcare coverage for 40,000 Washington children."

This ad and others like it are paid for by a PAC called Evergreen Progress.

Its chief funders are the Democratic Governors Association and labor unions like the SEIU.

So why the early ads in this year's gubernatorial race? One reason says Democratic political strategist Cathy Allen is the Washington State primary has been moved up to August.

Cathy Allen: "And so what happens is that everyone starts getting nervous because those absentee ballots are going to be in the mail that first week in August and so right now weíve got less than thirty days until you start getting your ballot."

But if Gregoire and Rossi are all but sure to advance to the November election -- why does the primary matter? Because, says Allen, the number of votes each candidate gets in the primary will be used to forecast the general election.

Cathy Allen: "She has to be able to show at least a two to five percent win of the total number of votes over his to be able to show the world that this is not clearly as close a race as all of the pundits love to say."

Republican strategist Randy Pepple has a different take on the early ads. He says PACs that want to influence the governor's race need to act now.

Later in the summer they'll have to compete with the Olympics, the presidential race, and even the gubernatorial candidates' own ads.

Randy Pepple: "So, I think independent groups are coming to the realization that they need to get started now trying to move that last five, ten percent of the electorate that hasn't made up its mind in this race because it's going to be razor thin."

Similar perhaps to what happened in 2004 between Rossi and Gregoire.

It's important to note that, by law, independent expenditure campaigns are not supposed to coordinate with the candidates and their campaigns. As for the accuracy of the ads -- while the facts may technically be correct both sides are spinning their version of the truth.

Both the Rossi and Gregoire campaigns have responded to the attack ads by creating web sites with catchy names: Fact Check Dino and Fight the Attacks.