David Schweikert is hammering back against an attack by his 5th Congressional District Republican primary rival, Susan Bitter Smith, after Bitter Smith put out a mailer attacking Schweikert's record as Maricopa County treasurer.

Tuesday morning, a hit piece from the Bitter Smith campaign showed up in mailboxes across the district saying Schweikert mismanaged the county's funds during his tenure as treasurer. Later that day, the Schweikert camp put out a robo-call refuting the charges and slamming Bitter Smith's "negative" tactics.

Brian Hummell, Bitter Smith's campaign manager, pointed to an audit of the treasurer's office from April 2007 to support his claim. The report stated that "some Treasurer’s Office actions conflict with uniform accounting practices and with State Statutes" by allowing its servicing bank "to extend credit beyond line of credit limits."

"What he did is not evidence of being conservative or evidence of strong fiscal management," said Brian Hummell, Bitter Smith's campaign manager. Hummell also said that Schweikert's actions as treasurer "resulted in two school districts being placed in receivership."

The Schweikert campaign shot back immediately, and within hours of seeing the Bitter Smith mailer had rolled out a robo-call attacking her tactics.

"Are you fed up with negative politics?" says a woman's voice in the call that the campaign estimates went out to between 20,000 and 40,000 numbers.

"In 2000, liberal Susan Bitter Smith was called 'Susan Gutter Smith' by the Arizona Republic for her dirty campaign tactics. Now Bitter Smith is back again, attacking strong conservative David Schweikert with more dirty politics and outright lies. Though we shouldn't be surprised: after all, Susan Bitter Smith isn't called 'Susan Gutter Smith' for nothing. Do we really want a liberal, tax-hiking lobbyist with the nickname 'Gutter Smith' representing us in Congress? Say no to 'Gutter Smith' and her dirty tricks campaign. Paid for by Schweikert for Congress."

Bill Connor, who manages Schweikert's campaign, explained that they were "fed up" with Bitter Smith's hits on Schweikert.

"We let a few things go," Connor said to PolitickerAZ.com. "However, once the rhetoric got ramped up to the point where it was distorting the record, we had to respond."

Connor said the claims by the Bitter Smith campaign were "libelous lies," and said, "The people of the district deserve to know that she stands for raising taxes and is pro-illegal alien."