New Mexico's already bitter gubernatorial campaign got even more heated Friday with the release of two new ads for Republican Susana Martinez, one of which was praised by former White House political director Karl Rove as the "Best rebuttal ad of (the year) so far."

In that ad, Martinez, who is district attorney in Las Cruces, points out that a teacher who spoke out for Diane Denish in a recent TV spot for the Democrat had been married to a man whom Martinez successfully prosecuted for kidnapping.

In the other ad, the Martinez campaign accuses Denish of taking large campaign contributions from Mesa del Sol after pushing tax breaks for the developer of the Albuquerque project — which employed Denish's husband.

Denish and other Democrats cried foul on both ads.

The first ad was in response to a TV spot produced and paid for by the National Education Association, a teacher's union that endorsed Denish. In the NEA ad, Las Cruces special-education teacher Freda Trujillo endorses Denish.

"Here's the reason she did it," Martinez says, pointing to a mug shot of Trujillo's former husband. "Here's her husband. We convicted him. He's in prison now for 23 years. Kidnapping. The ad looks different now, doesn't it?"

Rove, who was President George W. Bush's political director, isn't the only national Republican who liked Martinez's spot. The conservative National Review's Jim Geraghty was even more enthusiastic, calling it "perhaps the best ad of this cycle."

Geraghty wrote, "Nothing flashy, no fancy graphics ... Just pointing out one really key fact that Susana Martinez's rival, Democrat Diane Denish, failed to mention in her last ad. With one unbelievable unforced error, the Denish campaign just nuked their own credibility."

But the Denish campaign and their allies said the ad was unfair. Some pointed to the fact that Martinez referred to convicted kidnapper Jesus Carmona as Trujillo's "husband" though the couple has been divorced for two years.

"Today, Susana Martinez attacked the messenger but had nothing to say about the message — which points to her less-than-honest, recorded stance for private school vouchers," NEA-NM president Sharon Morgan said in a statement Friday. "Obviously, attacking Freda was an easier path to deflect the issue of her flip-flopping on this very important issue to our public schools and our public school employees."

"Freda is on record saying Martinez did her job as a prosecutor and helped put a criminal in jail. That is a completely different issue than whether she will be a Governor who supports public education."

Denish spokesman Chris Cervini in a statement called Martinez's ad "a shameless attempt to embarrass a teacher who had the courage to speak her mind, but it's Martinez who should be embarrassed."

The second ad concerns Herb Denish, who was a registered lobbyist in the city of Albuquerque for Forest City Covington, developers of the Mesa Del Sol project from 2006 to 2009.

The ad says Forest City Covington contributed $320,000 to Gov. Bill Richardson and Lt. Gov. Diane Denish.

Apparently most of those contributions were for Richardson. According to the most recent figures available from the Institute of Money in State Politics, Forest City and Mesa del Sol have contributed about $49,500 to Diane Denish herself since 2002. While governor and lieutenant governor candidates run on a ticket, each maintains separate campaign accounts.

The ad goes on to say that Forest City got $500 million in "special tax deals." Says the narrator, "Denish got paid, developers got rich on our tax money."

The Denish campaign called the ad "a blatant lie." They point out that Herb Denish, while registered to lobby Albuquerque's city government, was never registered to lobby state government.

The campaign also quoted minutes of state Board of Finance meetings between 2006 and 2010 in which Diane Denish recused herself from the discussion or was excused from a meeting in which Mesa del Sol tax incentives or other business involving Forest City Covington was discussed.

"Diane has always provided disclosure and has acted according to the highest ethical standards," Cervini said in a news release.

The Martinez campaign did not reply to a request for comment about Cervini's statements.

Contact Steve Terrell at 986-3037 or sterrell@sfnewmexican.com. Read his political blog at roundhouseroundup.com.