Local Candidates: Are you Debating?

For many candidates the debate season has been in full swing for a couple of months now.  Take our instance our governor’s race in Minnesota where there have been over a dozen debates so far and several yet to come.  While this certainly is an outlier, what should be recognized is that candidates need to take advantage of opportunities to debate their opponent if they haven’t done so already.  This particularly goes for those running at the local level, from school board to county commissioner, and certainly those running against incumbents.

Since American Majority is focused on local candidates, below are a few points that these candidates should take into consideration when arranging and prepping for debates.

First of all, local candidates need to realize that just because they might not be running in a high profile race it doesn’t mean that people aren’t interested.  To get them engaged, you just need to raise the visibility of the race.  One of the ways to do this is provide outreach to various organizations and entities that might have an interest in hosting a debate.  A great place to start is with your local newspaper or chamber of commerce.   The more localized the better.

Secondly, candidates should reach out to other like-minded candidates running for similar positions in their city or county.  Often entities will host a debate for a number of local candidates at one time.  For example, if several city council candidates express interest to their local newspaper about hosting a debate, the likelihood of a debate being arranged will significantly improve.

Thirdly, once a debate has been confirmed candidates need to make certain that you get all the information they can about the particular debate format.  Organizations will usually give you the issues to be discussed beforehand, sometimes even providing you with questions in advance.  Getting all the information available will put candidates in a position to excel during the debate.

Finally, candidates should think about doing some mock debate sessions with their advisors or key volunteers based on the information attained from the organization arranging the debate.  Having staff pose questions to candidates in a debate-style format will make them that much more prepared for the real deal.