Sen. Robert Hurt, R-Chatham, said today that he is not willing to debate Jeffrey C. Clark, a Tea Party member from Danville and independent candidate who is running against Hurt and U.S. Rep. Tom Perriello, D-Ivy, in November’s election.
“We cannot allow the important debate in this election to be sidetracked by a candidate who is not serious about his campaign or his ability to win,” Hurt said in a written statement released after midnight Friday.
On Saturday, Hurt told The Daily Progress that he was “absolutely” willing to appear at debates with Clark and Perriello during the campaign.
But Hurt’s campaign later said the candidate’s response to questioning was not a direct reply to the question of whether he would debate Clark.
According to a transcript of an audio recording of the interview, conducted last Saturday morning, The Daily Progress asked Hurt if he is “going to be willing to debate Jeff Clark and Tom Perriello?”
Hurt replied: “We need to work out all of the details, but debates are a very, very important part of elections and obviously we want to make ourselves available to all of the citizens who will be judging us and we’re committed to doing that but obviously we have the details to work out. We haven’t talked with the Perriello campaign - I don’t think - about what they’re interested in.”
The Daily Progress, again, asked: “But would you be willing to?”
Hurt replied: “Absolutely.”
On Wednesday, Perriello’s campaign cited The Progress article and said Perriello agrees with his GOP challenger that Clark should be allowed to participate in the upcoming debates.
“If there’s one thing I’ve learned from my first 18 months in Congress, it’s that there are a whole lot of opinions across our district,” Perriello said in a statement. “Some of these viewpoints are represented by Sen. Hurt and some by Mr. Clark, and I look forward to a substantive, honest campaign that brings these discussions more clearly into the public arena. I strongly agree with Sen. Hurt that Mr. Clark should be included in public debates and I look forward to a spirited discussion with both of them.”
In Hurt’s statement, however, he clarified that he is not willing to debate Clark and suggested that Perriello has “jumped on the opportunity to dodge a head-on debate with me.”
Clark, for his part, said he is serious about his campaign and wants to have a voice in any debates. Clark is running, he has said, because he does not believe Hurt is conservative enough.
“Sen. Hurt will try to marginalize us every step of the way,” Clark said. “If we’re allowed in the debate, it makes the whole dynamic a whole lot murkier for him. It won’t be as easy for him to distinguish himself from Tom Perriello.”
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