No-show cancels Senate forum

WASILLA — A forum scheduled Thursday to hear views of candidates running for U.S. Senate fell apart and, in the aftermath, many are pointing fingers.

The only candidate who made it to the event at the Alaska Club was Republican Joe Miller, who said he felt his opponent, Republican incumbent Lisa Murkowski, is ducking debates.

“It’s disappointing that Senator Murkowski’s staff chose to cancel their appearance at this event,” Miller said. “I’m here. That speaks for itself.”

On the organizers’ side, Diana Straub, who is coordinating the events for the Greater Palmer and Greater Wasilla chambers of commerce, placed the blame at Murkowski’s feet as well, as evidenced by a note she left at the front desk for potential attendees saying, in part, “If you’ve been inconvenienced, please contact your senator.”

But the Murkowski camp said it never gave a hard commitment to attend.

“We have told them from the beginning that this was not a day that Lisa was available,” campaign manager John Bitney said Thursday. “There were Senate votes today; there was a markup in committee.”

He said the original date for the event, July 8, would have worked. When the chambers moved it, Bitney said he told the chambers he’d try and see if a staffer could stand in, but his boss put the kibosh on that.

“She just did not think it was appropriate to have someone else speaking on her behalf in a debate with another candidate,” he said. “It’s not fair to her. It’s not fair for the person who is trying to speak for her. It’s not fair to the voters.”

Straub said she understands the senator can’t be in two places at once. She just would have liked more notice. She said she didn’t know the Murkowski campaign wasn’t going to show until just prior to the event.

Bitney, for his part, said he told Straub Wednesday the campaign wouldn’t be appearing.

Straub said she also didn’t agree that the Murkowski campaign was firmly committed to the July 8 date. She said the campaign was in favor of moving the event.

Bitney said that’s true in a sense — Murkowski would have preferred an August date, since the Senate isn’t in session then.

“She was elected to do this job and therefore it’s important for her to be there,” he said.

As for Miller’s charge his boss ducks debates, Bitney said that’s not true. The campaign has scheduled three debates, one in Fairbanks, one in Soldotna and one on radio station KAKM. All three are in August.

Straub has said before that August dates don’t work — the field of candidates running for local municipal offices won’t have solidified until the end of July. Putting an event for a statewide race in August would necessarily pre-empt one of those more local debates.

As for why she couldn’t have a forum with just one candidate, Straub said that since the event was to be broadcast live on the radio, doing it with just Miller would have run afoul of Alaska’s election rules.

“I can’t allow Mr. Miller to just have 90 minutes of air time,” she said.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.