Staff for Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler’s re-election campaign said Monday the team was prepared to start holding mayoral debates for the 2020 primary in the new year.
The brief statement, released Monday afternoon, came in response to candidate Sarah Iannarone’s challenge one week prior. In a Dec. 9 letter, Iannarone’s campaign asked the mayor to join her on stage for six debates before the primary in May.
Wheeler’s response did not mention Iannarone by name, but said the mayor looked “forward to participating in joint candidate events, debates and forums that showcase the diversity of ideas in this race.”
These forums, as described by the Wheeler campaign, would be “as representative as possible of the entirety of the field of candidates.”
Iannarone’s campaign had previously said they hoped to keep future debates limited to a smaller pool of “viable candidates” to avoid stretching viewers’ bandwidth for local electoral politics and keeping the debates focused.
Iannarone’s letter had suggested each debate would be about a topic pertinent to Portlanders: environmental justice and climate change; housing affordability and homelessness; police accountability and public safety; inequality and poverty; good government and civil society; and health.
The response from the Wheeler campaign did not address the specific topics nor the number of debates that Iannarone had suggested.
Amy Rathfelder, Wheeler’s deputy campaign manager, said the two opponents will likely hammer out an official number of debates together. As for the topics under discussion, Rathfelder said they’ll likely make a few additions to Iannarone’s list in the next few days.
In a statement, Iannarone’s campaign said they appreciated Wheeler’s response.
“We are happy that Mayor Wheeler has accepted our request to participate in debates,” the Iannarone campaign said. “We are committed to ensuring an inclusive, equitable, and substantive conversation around who is the best choice to address the problems that have continued to impact all Portlanders.”
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