D.C. mayoral candidates Muriel E. Bowser, running on the Democratic ticket, and David A. Catania and Carol Schwartz, running as independents, will be attending a candidate’s forum at AU on Sept. 18. It will be the first debate of the general election Bowser’s campaign said she will attend .
The forum, jointly hosted by AU Community Relations, Kennedy Political Union, Ward 3 Vision and Palisades Citizens’ Association, will take place in the Katzen Arts Center Abramson Recital Hall. Free tickets for the community will begin dispersing at 5:30 p.m. on the day of the event. The forum will start at 7 p.m.
NBC4 reporter Tom Sherwood will moderate the forum, having previously moderated a Democratic primary debate at AU in February. Online columnist Clinton Yates and WAMU’s Patrick Madden and Kavitha Cardozo will be a part of a media panel. Andrew Huff, Director of AU Community Relations, said the event will act as a “candidate conversation,” rather than a formal debate.
Bowser, who graduated from AU with a Masters in Public Policy, won the democratic primary in April, beating incumbent Mayor Vincent C. Gray. She is a councilmember representing Ward 4. The general election will happen Nov. 4.
Bowser leads her closest challenger, Catania, by 33 percentage points in a Washington Post poll March. In the District, an overwhelmingly Democratic city, winning the Democratic primary election is tantamount to victory in the general election. The city has only elected African American Democratic mayors since the 1973 Home Rule Act, which granted the District the rights to elect a mayor and 13-member council.
The Catania campaign contends they have cut Bowser’s advantage down to the “high single digits“ in an internal campaign poll, which they declined to release publicly. D.C. has never elected a non-Democratic, white and openly gay candidate to city hall. Catania is an At-Large Councilmember.
Bowser refused to debate any candidate until they officially qualified for the ballot late summer. Catania and Schwartz are both on the ballot now, but Bowser won’t be attending a proposed debate on Sept. 10 and Sept. 17, the latter hosted in her home ward of Ward 4. Her campaign says they promised AU the opportunity to have the first debate, yet Huff and Sherwood both told the Washington Post such an agreement was never in place.
“KPU remains committed to driving the political discourse here at AU,” said Tyler Bowders, director of KPU. “The Mayoral Debate provides us with the unique opportunity to connect AU with its neighbors in D.C.”
