Bob Stefanowski, the Republican candidate for governor, criticized Gov. Ned Lamont in a campaign video released Friday on the issue of abortion, his wife’s business interests and Connecticut’s business and tax climate.

All in 39 seconds.

Stefanowski highlighted out-of-state business interests of Annie Lamont a week after the Democratic governor urged businesses to leave states with restrictive abortion policies and come to Connecticut.

“Ned Lamont wants businesses to move to Connecticut because of our abortion laws, but celebrates that his own family set up its new businesses in Nashville because it was ‘less complicated,’” Stefanowski said.

The Lamont campaign called it “yet another false attack from Bob Stefanowski.”

It accused the GOP challenger of “calling for restrictions on Roe vs. Wade, while Gov. Lamont is proud to have helped make Connecticut one of the most pro-choice states in the nation.”

“Bob knows he can’t attack the governor’s record of four years of economic growth, passing balanced budgets and securing record tax cuts so instead he is trying to run a campaign against his wife,” the governor’s campaign said in an emailed statement.

Lamont and Lt. Gov. Susan Bysiewicz invited businesses in an open letter July 1 to move to Connecticut where abortion access has been state law since 1990. “Now more than ever is the time to look at Connecticut as the future home of your business,” they said.

Stefanowski replayed video of Lamont saying in November 2021 that his wife is in Nashville, “setting up companies there because Connecticut is pretty complicated.” The governor was responding to questions about Annie Lamont’s investment firm and his announcement of the move by the Digital Currency Group to Stamford from New York.

Annie Lamont had sold her financial interest in the blockchain technology company seven months earlier.

Lamont said his wife found it difficult to invest in Connecticut because her work as an investor and his role as governor occasionally drew ethical questions he blamed on politics.

Days after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the constitutional guarantee of abortion last month, a federal court vacated a lower court’s injunction against a Tennessee law banning abortions after a heartbeat can be detected, usually at around six weeks of gestation.

Stefanowski claimed Lamont held his own business interests to a different standard than he does for other companies.

“Ned Lamont: Other people’s companies should care about abortion laws,” the narrator says. “His? Eh . . .not so much.”

Stefanowski also accused Lamont of doing “nothing to improve Connecticut’s business climate,” but has burdened small businesses with hundreds of millions of dollars in taxes and red tape. His campaign cited taxes to finance the Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund, an additional tax of 9 cents per gallon on diesel fuel that took effect July 1, a prepared food tax and other taxes.

Lamont has ruled out what he calls “broad-based tax increases,” saying policies in the past that hiked taxes gave Connecticut a bad reputation in the business community.

Stephen Singer can be reached at ssinger@courant.com.