A GOP delegate filed a complaint Tuesday alleging Mark Neumann’s gubernatorial campaign made calls to herself and other GOP delegates that were misleading and threatening, an incident the Scott Walker campaign is condemning as an attempt to smother delegate support for Walker.

Kathy Kiernan, a GOP delegate from Richfield and a Walker supporter, filed a complaint with the Government Accountability Board to investigate calls where callers allegedly either refused to identify themselves or falsely claimed they were from the Republican Party.

The Neumann campaign maintains volunteers followed a script and were specifically instructed to identify themselves. The calls themselves were only intended to gauge opinion on the endorsement votes scheduled for the May 22 state GOP convention, Bruce Pfaff, a spokesperson for Neumann, said.

Delegates will vote on the Republican Party endorsement for governor at the convention, and a candidate must receive the support of 60 percent of the delegates in order to be endorsed by the Republican Party.

“There must be some sort of misunderstanding,” Pfaff said. “All volunteers absolutely would identify themselves. That’s what everyone was told to do; there’s no reason they would not have done that.”

The caller allegedly asked Kiernan how she felt about the endorsement process at the convention after confirming Kiernan was a delegate as well as a Walker supporter, identifying himself as calling from the Republican Party, Kiernan said.

“I knew the Republican Party would not be making those calls, so my ears perked up, and the red flag went up,” Kiernan said. When Kiernan pressed for more information, the caller allegedly hung up.

Some of the calls made to other delegates and Republicans were more aggressive in their questioning, with a caller in one case allegedly asking a delegate if she thought she was even qualified to be a delegate, Kiernan said.

The potentially intimidating nature of the calls, as well as the alleged false identities given by the callers, was what prompted Kiernan to file the complaint and request an investigation by the GAB into the calls.

Although information about complaints and investigations is not public, staff attorneys and investigators for the GAB will look into any complaints that are received, Reid Magney, spokesperson for the GAB, said.

Kiernan estimated about 12 people received the allegedly misleading calls.

Neumann’s campaign has been working to locate the source of the calls, Pfaff said.

The Walker campaign is skeptical, however, claiming the incident represents a trend of increasingly dirty tactics on the part of the Neumann campaign.

“It wasn’t an isolated incident; it was (a) coordinated effort to single out the people who would make the endorsement votes and dissuade them from voting for Scott,” Jill Bader, spokesperson for Walker, said.

Pfaff did not think the complaint would have a negative impact on Neumann’s chances at the convention, adding that the Walker campaign does not seem ready to deal with the reality of campaigning in a statewide election.