Lt. Governor Diane Denish said in an interview to be televised on Friday evening that it’s a “patently false lie” that her office used federal taxpayer dollars for campaign Christmas cards.

The interview was conducted by Peter St. Cyr for KNME’s New Mexico in Focus, and you can see the clip in question on the show’s Web site. Denish’s remarks refute a report written by Jim Scarantino, the editor of a new website called The New Mexico Watchdog, which is funded by the libertarian Rio Grande Foundation.

Denish said that her office has canceled checks and invoices showing that the Christmas cards were printed and mailed out of campaign funds, so the allegation is a patently false lie. She said Scarantino didn’t check his facts or ask follow-up questions.

Denish also took aim at the Watchdog, saying it is:

…a rightwing conservative group that’s in the business of attacking me and other people that they want to sully their record, if they can. That’s really an important note…they’re in the business, they’re doing it all across the country, they mischaracterize the facts.

After Scarantino’s report was published, the Republican party, former NM Rep. Heather Wilson, and several Republican gubernatorial candidates issued press statements blasting Denish.