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Many Republican voters still undecided on GOP U.S. Senate primary

A narrator in the ad says: "John James is no conservative" and "James is a phony conservative".

LANSING, Mich. (WZZM) - Recent polling done by a consultant favoring Republican U.S. Senate candidate Sandy Pensler still shows more than a third of all Republican primary voters are undecided who they want to go on to face Democrat Sen. Debbie Stabenow in the November election.

Pensler, a businessman from Grosse Pointe, and John James, a former Army captain and West Point graduate who lives in Farmington Hills are the only two candidates on the August 7, 2018 ballot.

The polling done by Tom Shields, President of MRG, found Pensler has a 10-point lead on James.

In recent days, Pensler has started airing an attack advertisement on television stations across the state. A narrator in the ad says: "John James is no conservative" and "James is a phony conservative".

James responded in a statement to us written by his campaign manager Tori Sachs: "The only thing this ad reveals is that despite outspending John 15-1 on TV, Pensler is running scared and terrified of the grassroots conservative movement that is coalescing around John. Pensler clearly believes his only path to victory is to distort John’s record. No one is going to fall for it."

Pensler is running on a campaign saying "he will renegotiate unfair trade deals, crack down on illegal immigration and support lower taxes on working families."

He has what appears to be an inherent advantage in the race, pouring $5 million of his own money into his campaign. He was born in Detroit and has worked with many different corporations over the years as a consultant with his company Pensler Capital.

James is an Iraq War combat veteran and businessman. He is running as a "pro-life, pro-Second Amendment, pro-business conservative who has demonstrated energetic leadership"

The two will debate on public TV on July 6th.

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