In a few hours I’ll be participating in the first debate in my campaign for a seat in the Connecticut State Senate. This debate, happening in Old Lyme, is the first of five that have been confirmed so far. Unfortunately, all of these confirmed debates are in the southern portion of our twelve town district. Furthermore, the Republican incumbent has not agreed to participate in one of the five and, at this point, is unwilling to schedule any more. My Democratic opponent has publicly challenged the Republican in this race to twelve debates, one in each town, however, I was left out of that open invitation.
Specifically, according to a blog post on this site, the Democratic campaign stated, “In hopes of promoting widespread public discussion of state and local issues, Democratic State Senate Candidate Emily Bjornberg proposed today that she and her Republican opponent hold twelve public debates before the November 4th General Election, one in each town of the 33rd State Senate District.” Although I was left out of that challenge (which I’m sure was just an unfortunate oversight) I agree that as candidates we should strive to reach as many people in our district as possible through rigorous debates of the issues most relevant to this part of Connecticut.
As such, I would also like to accept my Democratic opponent’s challenge and also encourage the incumbent to do the same. In the spirit of democracy and fair competition I invite both of my opponents to bring these conversations to the northern part of our district, specifically, Colchester, East Hampton, and Portland. With more than six full weeks left before election day there is more than enough time to bring debates to the parts of the district that are otherwise ignored. Both of the other candidates know how to get in touch with me so I’m hoping that we can come to agreement on how we can bring debates to the entire district. You can help by contacting the other candidates and encouraging them to participate. In the meantime, wish me luck on tonight’s debate!
My priorities are improving job growth through ramping up the state’s clean energy economy, improving education for all of our children and young people, and stabilizing taxes for low and middle income families. In the coming weeks I’ll post more specific information on each of these priorities as well on other issues relevant to this race. In the meantime, if you have questions or want to know my thoughts on an issue, feel free to email me at colinbennettforsenate@gmail.com, or just comment on this post.
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This is me last year at the Indigenous Enslavement and Incarceration in North American History Conference hosted by Yale.