Lindsey Graham campaign ad appears to show opponent with digitally darkened skin

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The re-election campaign of Senator Lindsey Graham has been accused of digitally darkening the skin of his opponent in an ad posted to Facebook.

The 23 July ad uses an image of candidate Jaime Harrison surrounded by a background portrait effect to place the focus on a foreground image of Kathy Griffin. The effect makes Mr Harrison's skin tone appear darker than the original image as published in the New York Times.

While the campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment, communications director TW Arrighi told CNN, which first reported the story, that the graphic used a common effect that could be seen in previous posts.

The Facebook post says: "Hollywood continues to bankroll my opponent, raising tens of thousands in campaign cash to attack me -- but they fail to understand this simple fact: South Carolinians won't stand for Radical Leftists telling them how to think and how to vote. Are you with me?"

In a statement to CNN, Mr Arrighi said it was a non-story and that the same effect was used on Mr Graham himself just days earlier.

"It's sad that detractors are making up fake accusations about this graphic -- intended to highlight Jaime Harrison's support from Kathy Griffin, a liberal actress who once posed with a fake severed head of Donald Trump," Mr Arrighi said.

"The artistic effect used, the same one that was used on Senator Graham just two days before in a video, is a non-story. The only people who want to shift focus from policies important to South Carolinians -- like creating jobs and bringing our medical supply chain back from China -- are liberal detractors who are trying to hide their radical positions."

Mr Arrighi appears to be referencing a 16 July video posted to Facebook in which the effect is used to place Mr Graham in the background with the interviewer in the foreground, with the effect switching to denote the person speaking during the audio clip.

While Mr Harrison's campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment, the Lexington County Democratic Party said that they would elect their candidate regardless of Mr Graham's "stunts".

"This is disgusting. SC will elect @harrisonjaime regardless of what kind of stunts Lindsey tries to pull," they said in a tweet. "He is so out of touch with SC voters. We don't care how dark a person's skin might be. We vote for the person, not their skin pigment. We all know Jaime and know a fake photo."