Mastriano challenges Shapiro to two debates, but only on his terms – By Charles Thompson (Penn Live) / Aug 16, 2022
State Sen. Doug Mastriano has proposed two October debates with Attorney General Josh Shapiro, his Democratic rival for Pennsylvania’s governor’s office, but this particular offer appears to be dead on arrival.
The Republican nominee’s proposed rules of engagement — cutting out all outside organizers and allowing debate questions only from campaign-selected moderators — were immediately rejected by Shapiro as an “unserious proposal” that his campaign argued would only encourage Mastriano’s pattern of refusing to take questions from members of Pennsylvania’s press corps.
There certainly appeared to be elements of gamesmanship involved for both sides.
Mastriano’s proposal called for the campaigns to jointly organize and pay for the 90-minute debates — which would be made available for broadcast and coverage by all news outlets — with each candidate getting to select one moderator of their choosing. That plan would at once let all Pennsylvania voters have some chances to size the candidates up side-by-side, while letting the Franklin County Republican stick to his secondary strategy of snubbing mainstream news outlets at every opportunity.
