Gotta admit, I called this one as soon as he proposed a set of five debates…
Hurt declines Charlottesville debates
Last week, Robert Hurt proposed a series of five debates for the candidates for the Republican 5th district candidates. The various Tea Party groups had proposed their own series of three debates prior to this.
Based of the various Tea Party groups’ record, those debates have a high potential to devolve into shouting matches and Hurt had absolutely nothing to gain by participating in their events. Hurt has a very little chance to ever get the vote of any of the devoted teaparty activists and he (and his strategists) know that. By setting up his own series of debates, Hurt implicitly declared himself as the front-runner by being able to control the number and location of debates. All of the other candidates have to fall in line with Hurt’s proposals because those are the only debates that will be “fair”. By making today’s announcement, Hurt has made a move which tells the teapartiers that he really doesn’t need to participate in anything that they do. Considering that the teapartiers are erratic at best, it’s definitely in Hurt’s interest to stay as far away from them as possible.
Hurt has made this move with a reasoning which is perfectly logical. Why would a State Senator do a debate in the middle of the legislative session? The timing of the teaparty debates were strange and Hurt shut the door on them. It’s a shame that the University of Virginia College Republicans’ debate also falls in this time frame, but I feel that this debate is just collateral damage from the strategy that Hurt is using.
Although I question Hurt’s call for a large number of debates (because the frontrunner has very little to gain from a debate), this also could be a part of a good strategy. All Hurt has to do is stand back and let the other candidates attack each other and cannibalize themselves.
We’ll see how things progress over the next few weeks.
I disagree with you on only one point: Hurt will get votes from tea partiers who want to defeat Perriello.
The problem is that there is the perception that Hurt had agreed to some of the Tea Party debates (http://va5thdistrict.com/2010/01/07/hurt-reneges-on-tea-party-debate/) and this now looks like Goode’s infamous backing out from televised debates during his failed reelection fight against Perriello. And now Hurt is leaving open the window to fundraise during the legislative session (http://www2.newsadvance.com/lna/news/state_regional/article/hurt_might_accept_campaign_money_during_session/22978/).
Individually his decisions may be sound. But they each come with collateral damage. Avoiding a debate with a hostile audience may be a good decision. But I’ll note that Perriello never baked down from hostile debates that Goode organized. Backing out of debates he may have agreed to? Bad.
Focusing on raising funds to defeat Perriello, since he’s certainly not going to stop fundraising during Congress’s session, is a good move for Hurt. But it also creates collateral damage.
I dont think this will have the same effect that Goode’s decision did. This is a primary, not a general. They are two VERY distinct races (just ask Deeds) and the procedural choices you make in one rarely have a huge impact on the general. Hurt made the right move here. He will get the support of the tea party movement when push comes to shove, unless a viable third party candidate (verga or mcpadden) decide to run as a “conservative” party candidate.
The other candidates could ignore him and make him look like a fool.