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Getty Gingrich calls on pro-Bush super PAC to take down Kasich attack

House Speaker Newt Gingrich is calling for a pro-Jeb Bush super PAC to take down an ad accusing John Kasich of imperiling national security.

The ad, titled “Dangerously Wrong,” uses images of ISIS and footage of Kasich from his days as House Budget Committee chairman while talking about his efforts to curb wasteful defense spending. The ad is running in South Carolina, a state filled with military interests and where national security is considered key.

“Iran. North Korea. ISIS. Threats to America are growing. But under Obama our military is shrinking. So why did John Kasich spend his career supporting massive defense cuts?” asks the ad from the Right to Rise super PAC. “Kasich wanted cuts so severe even Bill Clinton said they would harm defense. John Kasich: Dangerously wrong on national security.”

During his nearly two-decade career in the House of Representatives, Kasich took aggressive steps to cut what he saw as wasteful military spending. He led the charge to terminate funding for the B-2 bomber, an expensive aircraft that had design flaws.

The commercial includes a clip from 1995 of Kasich saying, “We’re going to make the Pentagon a triangle. I’m thrilled…I spent a career trying to rein in defense spending.”

But in a statement to POLITICO on Friday evening, Gingrich, who served with Kasich in the House of Representatives during the 1980s and 1990s, pushed back, saying that, "Any suggestion that John Kasich is anti-defense is simply false. I served with him for 16 years and he consistently fought for a better, more effective military.”

Gingrich, who on won the South Carolina primary as a presidential candidate in 2012 and hasn’t endorsed in the presidential race, added: “Any ad attacking Kasich on defense should be pulled as false and misleading."

A Right to Rise spokesman, Paul Lindsay, responded: “John Kasich's long history of cutting critical national defense projects is well documented, from both his record and his own mouth.”

Lindsay gave no indication the anti-Kasich commercial would be removed from the South Carolina airwaves. The spot began airing on Friday in the Charleston and Myrtle Beach TV markets, according to a media buyer who monitors political spending.

Kasich is riding a wave of momentum following his strong second place showing in the New Hampshire primary. While the moderate Ohio governor is not expected to fare well in South Carolina, some Bush aides are concerned that he cut siphon off votes in the state that might otherwise go to Bush.

The Bush campaign has been telegraphing that it intends to target Kasich on defense spending – going so far as to highlight it in a post-New Hampshire internal “talking points” memo.

“Kasich has consistently supported gutting the military and has no viable path in the Palmetto State,” the memo said.