The lawyers for U.S. Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kansas, said in a Monday letter that the Rev. Adam Hamilton's campaign had published and distributed ads about Marshall's medical debt collection practices that were "defamatory." The ad begins with Meischa Zimmerman, who said she was arrested while eight months pregnant for missing a $50 payment to Marshall. She was paying roughly $50 a month to account for 18% interest on nearly $3,600 in total debt, according to court records. Do you think it is appropriate to arrest people for medical debt?

Meischa Zimmerman was one of more than 700 patients who Marshall sued while a practicing physician in Great Bend, KS according to reporting by the New York Times. "The unmistakable message to a reasonable viewer is that Senator Marshall caused a pregnant patient to be arrested and jailed for missing a single $50 payment. That message is false in every material respect," the Marshall lawyer's letter said. The Hamilton campaign's ad had been viewed more than one million times on X. Do you believe Marshall's attorney or the patients who were arrested?

Heartland Regional OBGYN, where Marshall worked, opened a case against the woman in December 2009, according to court documents. Zimmerman was first arrested in 2011. She said in the Hamilton campaign ad that she was handcuffed while pregnant in front of her 2-year-old daughter. Marshall's lawyers took issue with three facets of the ad. They said Zimmerman wasn't arrested for a missed payment but, instead, for failing to appear in court. They said the campaign ad frames the premise of the arrest on a $50 bill rather than the sum of Zimmerman's debts. They said the arrest wasn't a surprise, arguing that court records show Zimmerman "was called to court in three different counties by eight different businesses over a multi-year period, including by a different hospital and in an eviction proceeding." Zimmerman said in the ad: "Roger Marshall preyed on the low-income families of Kansas." Do you think Roger Marshall preyed on the low-income families of Kansas?

Marshall's attorney's letter demanded the Hamilton campaign, within 24 hours, remove the ad, issue a formal retraction and apology and cease further republication or promotion of false claims. As of Monday afternoon, the campaign had neither issued an apology nor removed the ad from social media. Hamilton's campaign, Hamilton for Kansas, spent at least $7,500 to play the ad to YouTube users between 165,000 and 280,000 times from Friday to Monday, according to Google ad tracking. Tyson Brody, a spokesperson for the campaign, said that "not once" did Marshall dispute Meischa's story "that his lawyers had her arrested in front of her children." "The lies in his letter are blatant and reek of desperation," Brody said. "The truth is what Roger Marshall did is extreme and hurt Kansans. Voters should know the truth about who their senator is and what he's done." Would you vote for a doctor to be a US senator if he preyed on his patients for as little as $50?