Getty Ben Jealous vs. Larry Hogan
Now that the one and only debate between Ben Jealous and Gov. Larry Hogan for the Maryland Governor’s race is over, everyone is going to have an opinion about who won. Let us know what you think. Scroll down to the end of this story to take the poll.
Tonight’s debate was broadcast at 7 p.m. Eastern, but the debate actually happened at 11 a.m. Eastern. Four journalists asked the candidates questions, and the debate lasted an hour.
The debate was held at the Maryland Public Television studios in Owing Mills, Maryland. The panelists were from The Washington Post, The Baltimore Sun, The Herald-Mail of Hagerstown, and WMDT-TV. The moderator was Jeff Salkin of MPT.
This debate was controversial even before it began. Early on, Jealous pushed for five debates and Hogan agreed to two. But then there was a standoff, and neither side could reach an agreement and they finally decided on one. Then after the debate was announced, Hogan’s campaign released emails that made it look like Jealous only wanted one debate, WBAL-TV reported. But Jealous said those emails were misleading and out of context.
I have challenged @LarryHogan to 5 debates.
So far he has refused to even consider any day in October.
Last time I checked, October has four full weeks.
So Governor, how about one a week next month?
Both campaigns began tweeting about the debate even before it aired:
How’d the debate go?
We gave @LarryHogan 5 minutes of debate time to describe his vision for getting our schools back to first in the nation.
He couldn’t.
Hogan For Governor Statement On @GovLarryHogan’s Debate Victory:
“Governor Hogan won today’s debate decisively by reminding voters about his bipartisan record of accomplishment and laying out a vision for an even more affordable Maryland.” #MDGovDebate #MDPolitics #ChangingMD
.@LarryHogan says that Maryland has made “tremendous gains” in job growth. But here are the facts:
1. Maryland ranks dead last in the past year in the region when it comes to job growth.
2. If Maryland had the job growth of Virginia we’d have 40,000 more jobs.
The election is November 6 from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. You can also participate in early voting from Thursday, Oct. 25 through Thursday, Nov. 1 from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. See a full list of precincts and polling locations here.
Who do you think won tonight’s debate? Let us know in the poll below.