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4 Top G.O.P. Candidates
Skip Debate With Minority Focus
By MICHAEL COOPER
Published: September 28, 2007
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/28/us/politics/28repubs.html?ref=politics
The moderator and the panel of
well-known journalists were there. A
large live audience was there, too,
along with the public television cameras
that carried the forum to television
sets across the nation. But where the
four leading Republican presidential
candidates were to have stood and
debated, four empty, silent lecterns sat
on the stage.
That was because the four all cited
scheduling conflicts and did not
participate last night in the
long-planned debate, where they were to
be quizzed by black and Hispanic
journalists about issues important to
minority voters. And their conspicuous
absence prompted a debate among
Republicans about whether their party is
attentive enough to black and Hispanic
voters.
If the top Republican candidates were
physically absent from the forum, held
at Morgan State University, a
historically black university in
Baltimore, they were very much on the
minds of those who came.
“Let me take a moment right here and now
to say hello to those of you viewers
from home: Mayor Rudy Giuliani, Senator
John McCain, Gov. Mitt Romney and
Senator Fred Thompson,” Tom Joyner, the
syndicated radio host, said in his
opening remarks, to knowing laughter
from the audience.
And several candidates who did show up
wasted little time in criticizing the
no-shows.
“I’m embarrassed for our party, and I’m
embarrassed for those who did not come,”
said Mike Huckabee, the former governor
of Arkansas. “Because there’s long been
a divide in this country. And it doesn’t
get better when we don’t show up.”
Senator Sam Brownback of Kansas began by
saying: “I think this is a disgrace that
they’re not here. I think it’s a
disgrace for our country, I think it’s
bad for our party, and I don’t think
it’s good for our future.”
“You know,” he said, “you grow political
parties by expanding your base, by
reaching out to people and getting more
people. What they’re doing is sending a
message of narrowing the base.”
Representative Duncan Hunter of
California said, “When we have family
reunions, and some of the family members
don’t show up, we do talk about them —
but I’m not going to do that.”
Alan Keyes, the conservative former
diplomat who recently entered the race,
defended the absentees.
“I think it is a little unfair to assume
that they didn’t show up tonight because
they were sending some message of a
negative kind to the black community,”
said Mr. Keyes, who is black. He noted
that they also skipped a recent debate
that was held to address issues
important to conservatives.
The debate comes shortly after Univision,
a Spanish-language network, canceled a
Republican debate only Mr. McCain agreed
to participate. All the leading
Democratic candidates participated in a
Univision debate this month, and all
appeared at the first All-American
Presidential Forum, which was held in
June at Howard University in Washington.
Tavis Smiley, the television host who
moderated both PBS forums, said at the
outset: “Some of the campaigns who
declined our invitations to join us
tonight have suggested publicly that
this audience would be hostile and
unreceptive. Since we are live on PBS
right now, I can’t tell you what I
really think of these kinds of
comments.”
Without the front-runners, some of the
candidates who have been overshadowed in
past debates got a chance to be heard on
a variety of issues, among them the
crisis in Darfur, capital punishment and
concerns about the racial discrimination
in the justice system.
Representative Tom Tancredo of Colorado
noted that he was the only Republican
candidate who showed up this summer at a
forum held by the National Association
for the Advancement of Colored People.
Representative Ron Paul of Texas was
cheered for his calls to bring the
troops back home and end the war on
drugs.
Candidates in both parties have shunned
debates that fell outside their comfort
zones. The leading Democratic candidates
did not attend a debate on Fox News
after liberal online groups urged them
to boycott Fox over what they said was
its conservative bias.
A number of prominent Republicans have
complained that the decision by the top
candidates to skip the debate could
endanger the party’s recent efforts to
reach out to black and Hispanic voters,
and warned that it could turn off
independents and swing voters in the
general election.
Even Mr. McCain, who defended his
decision to skip the debate at a
breakfast speech in New York City,
voiced concerns.
“I think we have work to do in the
African-American community,” he said,
adding that he is concerned that
Republicans are also failing to reach
out to Hispanic voters. “I think that we
have to remind ourselves, as well as our
constituents, that we are the party of
Abraham Lincoln.”
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