Missouri senate candidates face-off over debates

SEDALIA, Mo. – Missouri candidates for the U.S. Senate nearly came nose to nose at the state fair in Sedalia Thursday.

In the more than 120 years of the fair, there has been occasional political clash, but no one seemed to remember anything like this.

Incumbent Republican Sen. Josh Hawley and his Democratic challenger Lucas Kunce were face-to-face at the ham breakfast, a fair tradition.

They sparred verbally for several minutes over holding a debate at or near the fairgrounds.

“Can you say yes to (a) Fox News (debate)?” Kunce repeatedly asked Hawley.

“Are you going to be debate today? If you show up to debate today, we’ll do a whole bunch more,” Hawley responded.

“I don’t think the guy seems very real,” Kunce told FOX 2 afterward. “It’s all kind of a show–he’s a real performer.”

“You’re still going to debate him somewhere?” FOX 2’s Andy Banker later asked Hawley.

“Sure, if we think he’s going to show up somewhere,” he answered.

Hawley showed up for a debate hours after the ham breakfast clash.

The event was to be hosted by the Missouri Farm Bureau, across the street from the fair.

Kunce supporters showed up chanting, “coward, coward,” at Hawley, pointing out that he had yet to agree to statewide televised debates. Kunce said the politically active Farm Bureau’s involvement in hosting a debate would run afoul of election law.

FOX 2 asked both candidates about what issues should they actually be debating.

“Josh Hawley marks zero dollars back to our state every single year,” Kunce said. “We’re winning votes everywhere I go in the state, and that’s because of what I stand for: freedom and investment in the state–the exact opposite of what Josh Hawley stands for.”

“We can talk about the border,” Hawley said.  “He wants open border. He’s for amnesty. He’s for paying illegals benefits.”

“We’ve got another big one on the ballot this fall. We’re going to codify Roe vs. Wade at the state level. I’m going to do it at the national level because that’s what people want,” Kunce said.

“I’m pro-life,” Hawley told FOX 2. “I’m for exceptions for rape, incest, life of the mother, but I’m 100 percent pro-life.”

There was also an independent Senate candidate there taking it all in: Joplin attorney and businessman, Jared Young.  He founded what he calls “The Better Party” to focus on issues instead of slinging political mud.

“It’s exactly the spectacle we’re all tired of,” Young said. “It’s the fighting, it’s the pettiness. We just want people who can actually sit down, talk to each other, and work together to solve problems.”

As for when the public might actually see a Hawley-Kunce debate, Kunce says he’s already agreed to five of them. Hawley says he’s ready to go, and Jared Yung says he’ll come too, if he’s invited.

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