Miller Challenges Murkowski to Primary Debate

Anchorage, Alaska — US Senate Candidate Joe Miller is inviting Senator Lisa Murkowski to a televised debate on August 17, 6:30pm, at the Wilda Marston Theatre, located in the Loussac Library in Anchorage.

The debate will be televised by local area networks and facilitated by three prominent local personalities to be chosen with input from each campaign. The debate format will include: 1) questions from the moderators to each of the candidates, with an opportunity for rebuttal; 2) questions provided by the audience to each candidate, followed again by rebuttals; and 3) a segment in which the candidates may ask questions of each other. The main purpose of the debate will be to allow the media, the public, and the candidates themselves to ask the hard questions with an opportunity for each candidate to “set the record straight.” The format will allow the fullest airing of the candidates’ views so Alaskan voters can make an informed decision.

Two of the three current candidate forums Senator Murkowski has said she will participate in are not really debates, but panel discussions. There will be candidates from all parties answering questions from the audience, which can be answered with 1-minute responses without opportunity for rebuttal. The third meeting of the candidates is a televised debate conducted by Public Television in their studio, which is not open to the public. Additionally, the debate’s format has very limited opportunity for rebuttal or interchange between the candidates. “Alaskan voters deserve to know where the person who will serve them for the next six years stands. This is the one opportunity they will have for a job interview, and they should have more than 30-second or 1-minute sound bites. They deserve a real debate,” said Miller.

Senator Murkowski was conspicuously absent from two earlier well-advertised forums. Less than a half hour before the Palmer-Wasilla Chambers of Commerce Candidates Forum, Murkowski’s campaign cancelled. The second debate sponsored by the Anchorage Second Amendment Task Force, also found Murkowski absent. “If the Senator is proud of her record in Washington, she should be more than willing to defend it and allow the Alaskan public to know where she stands. They deserve to know,” said Miller.

The Joe Miller Campaign requests the Senator respond by 6:30pm, August 5th 2010.