Democratic gubernatorial candidate Mary Burke said on Monday that an ad that earned a controversial “Pants on Fire” rating for truthfulness was not, in fact, misleading.

The ad, in which Burke claimed unemployment has risen during Gov. Scott Walker’s tenure as governor, received a “pants on fire” rating from the fact-checking organization PolitiFact, indicating a claim that is “false and ridiculous.” PolitiFact wrote that unemployment started at 7.7 percent at the beginning of Walker’s term and has since dropped to 6.1 percent.

Burke, however, said her ad was meant to highlight the difference in the unemployment rate when she was secretary of commerce, from 2005 to 2007. At that point, the rate was 4.8 percent.

“The ad I ran is in response to … misleading claims from the Republican Governors Association’s ads,” Burke said. “Unemployment when I was commerce secretary was 4.8 percent. It’s currently 6.2 percent. I think that’s ‘up’ in anyone’s book.”

Furthermore, she said, the numbers under Walker are misleading.

“The only reason unemployment went down is, unfortunately, (that) people are dropping out of the workforce because they’re not finding opportunities,” she said.

Burke remained uncommitted to a wholesale repeal of Act 10, but did say she would work to restore collective bargaining rights and encouraging competitive wages and benefits for public-sector workers.

“I think it was only reasonable to ask for contributions to healthcare and pensions (in 2011) but those were on the table,” she said. “I don’t think (collective bargaining) stands in the way of making sure we have effective, efficient, and accountable government.

"But we also have to make sure that we're attracting good people to our public sectors," she said.