Angle sends cease and desist letter to Reid over website

FILE - In this June 8, 2010 file photo, Nevada Republican Senate candidate Sharron Angle shakes hands of supporters in Las Vegas. Tea party darling Angle engineered a come-from-behind victory in Nevada over an establishment-preferred candidate and will challenge Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid in November. (AP Photo/Isaac Brekken, File)

FILE - In this June 8, 2010 file photo, Nevada Republican Senate candidate Sharron Angle shakes hands of supporters in Las Vegas. Tea party darling Angle engineered a come-from-behind victory in Nevada over an establishment-preferred candidate and will challenge Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid in November. (AP Photo/Isaac Brekken, File)

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Sharron Angle's campaign sent a cease and desist letter to Sen. Harry Reid's campaign last week after a copy of her pre-primary election website was relaunched as www.therealsharronangle.com, which was later taken down.

After winning the June 8 primary, Angle took down her website and relaunched a new, glossier and trimmer version on Thursday.

Reid's campaign then launched a copy of Angle's former website and accused her toning down her rhetoric on the new website.

The two-page cease and desist letter, sent on July 2 by an attorney representing the Friends of Sharron Angle, said Reid's campaign had violated federal copyright laws and demanded Reid's campaign forward any names and e-mails that may have been collected by the copied website.

There were differences between Angle's former and new sites, namely a missing endorsements page and an edited, scaled-down version of her issues page. For example, the new website made no mention of her position on Yucca Mountain, which is to keep it open, and her calls to dismantle the U.S. Department of Education.

While Reid's campaign said the cease and desist letter amounted to a frivolous lawsuit threat, the copied version of Angle's former website had been taken down since it went up on Thursday.

The web address for www.therealsharronangle.com is now directed to www.sharronsundergroundbunker.com.

"Make no mistake, the Reid campaign was forced to take this site down because they were breaking several laws and trying deceive voters," said Angle spokesman Jerry Stacy. "You're going to see a lot of dirty tricks like that from Reid's campaign."

In a statement, Reid's campaign said, "Sharron Angle is trying to silence, well, Sharron Angle."

"Sharron has long believed in killing Social Security, eliminating the Departments of Education and Energy and shipping nuclear waste to Nevada," said spokesman Jon Summers. "We've always heard that Sharron Angle is an unapologetic conservative. It has to be embarrassing for her to have her handlers trying to hide who she really is."

Reid spokesman Zac Petkanas said the campaign did not take down the former website because of Angle's cease and desist letter.

* Story updated as of 7:25 p.m.

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