US Senate candidates Larry Pressler (I), Rick Weiland (D), and Gordon Howie (I) walking up to the stage at the Dakotafest debate. Photo by Ken Santema.
Tomorrow, September 10th, at 7:00 pm CT, KSFY will be hosting the first televised debate between the US Senate Candidates on the South Dakota ballot this fall. It also worth noting that CSPAN will be airing the debate on CSPAN2. I think it is pretty cool that South Dakota is going to get our US Senate debate televised nationally. This is a great chance for all four candidates to show why they would make a good US Senator before the constituents of South Dakota and the nation as a whole. The only problem is one of the candidates has decided not to attend the debate.
Rick Weiland (D), Larry Pressler (I), and Gordon Howie (I) have all confirmed they will participate in the debate. Republican candidate Mike Rounds declined to attend due to scheduling conflicts. It is hard to imagine what kind of scheduling conflict would be more important than a televised US Senate debate broadcast not just locally, but nation-wide as well. This wasn’t a surprise, the Rounds campaign announced back in July they would limit debates to only four. Moves like this will make it hard for the Rounds campaign to defend itself from claims that Rounds cares more about his big donors than he does about constituents.
Even with Rounds missing I look forward to watching the debate. Hopefully the debate will include some topics that weren’t covered in the Dakotafest and State Fair debates. Part of me is curious to see if Rounds absence from this debate will have any impact on his polling numbers…
