The campaign of GOP Senator Conrad Burns had a curious reaction to a local paper's decision to write an article about a poll showing Burns down: It lashed back at the newspaper, yanking its credentials to cover Burns' election night event. Making matters even stranger, the paper, the Great Falls Tribune, hadn't even comissioned the poll. It was done by U.S.A. Today and found Dem Jon Tester leading Burns 50%-41%. The paper simply wrote a story about it. But a Burns spokesman defended the punishment: ""Running a bogus poll on the day before an election to try and suppress Republican voter turnout is irresponsible," he said. More after the jump.

From the Billings Gazette:

A Burns spokesman dismissed the USA Today/Gallup poll as inaccurate and initially said the campaign was revoking one newspaper's credentials to attend Burns' election night event in Billings because it wrote about the poll.

Jason Klindt first said Monday that the Great Falls Tribune would not be allowed to attend, before changing his mind later in the day.

"Running a bogus poll on the day before an election to try and suppress Republican voter turnout is irresponsible and in poor taste," Klindt said Monday.

But then the Burns campaign apparently changed its mind and reinstated the paper's credentials:

The campaign decided to allow the paper's reporters to attend "so as not to punish the readers," Klindt said.

How magnanimous of the Burns campaign. Incidentally, other polls suggest that the race has tightened somewhat in recent days.