Photo

GREENVILLE, S.C. – Moments after Senator Marco Rubio left the stage at a rally on Thursday, one of his top advisers summoned reporters and handed each of them a sheet of paper.

On the paper was a “completely invented photo,” in the words of the adviser, Todd Harris, who said it had just appeared on a website paid for by Mr. Rubio’s rival, Senator Ted Cruz.

It was the start of the latest chapter in heated arguments raging between Mr. Rubio and Mr. Cruz in South Carolina, as they fight for what recent polls are saying will be second place in Saturday’s Republican primary.

Much of the fury feels somewhat manufactured, but that has not stopped the campaigns from expressing it, loudly, over and over in this state.

The image, which appeared on the website called the Real Rubio Record, appears to show Mr. Rubio shaking hands with President Obama in front of the Capitol in Washington. On the right side, these words are etched into the picture: “The Rubio-Obama Trade Pact.”

“Rubio,” it reads, “cast the deciding vote to fast-track three highly secretive trade deals negotiated by Obama.”

It is a reference to a Senate vote Mr. Rubio cast in favor of granting Mr. Obama the authority to negotiate a global trade agreement. As it happens, Mr. Cruz voted for the same legislation, but later reversed course when it came up for a second vote.

Mr. Harris, the Rubio adviser, called it “the most egregious example” of Mr. Cruz’s campaign style, which he called “phony” and “deceitful.”

Mr. Harris then analyzed the image in clinical detail.

“This is not Marco Rubio,” Mr. Harris said, pointing to the image of Mr. Rubio’s face, which appears to have been somewhat sloppily superimposed over another man’s body.

“This person, we don’t know who this is — they Photoshopped Marco’s face onto this body,” Mr. Harris said.

Mr. Cruz’s campaign did not deny that the image was altered. “Two days before the presidential primary in South Carolina, they want to talk about a picture we used,” a top Cruz aide, Rick Tyler, told CNN. “If Rubio has a better picture of him shaking hands with Barack Obama, I’m happy to swap it out,” he added.

The episode did not end at the rally. About an hour later, at another Rubio campaign rally in Anderson, S.C., Mr. Harris raised the topic again, by showing reporters what he said was the original image of a white man shaking the hand of a black man. Several details from the image matched up identically with those in the picture from the Cruz-sponsored website.

Mr. Harris said that Mr. Rubio’s wife, Jeanette, had done some online sleuthing and found the original image. As rendered on the anti-Rubio website, the position of the two men in the picture has changed from the supposed original version.

“They reversed it,” Ms. Rubio wrote to Mr. Harris in a text message that he showed to reporters. (This, Mr. Harris said, is a simple task using photo-altering software.)

Mr. Harris, during his talk with reporters, repeatedly sought to portray the Cruz campaign as suffused with deception.

“There is a culture of dishonesty from top to bottom in the Cruz for President campaign,” he said.