All four candidates to fill the U.S. Senate seat vacated by the death of Robert C. Byrd will participate in a debate on Oct. 18 co-sponsored by The Associated Press and West Virginia University’s P.I. Reed School of Journalism.

The event comes just 15 days before Democrat Joe Manchin, Republican John Raese, Mountain Party candidate Jesse Johnson and Constitution Party candidate Jeff Becker face off for the seat Byrd held for 51 years.

School of Journalism Dean Maryanne Reed will moderate the event, which will be held at the Morgantown studios of West Virginia Public Broadcasting and be broadcast live from 8 p.m. to 9 p.m. on radio and television. The School will also host a live webcast at http://journalism.wvu.edu/webcast. It will also be broacast on C-SPAN.

WVU Chief of Staff Jay Cole said the School of Journalism’s participation is a natural fit.

“Civic education and engagement are two important parts of WVU’s mission as a public, land-grant university,” Cole said. “Through co-sponsorship of this debate with The Associated Press and Dean Reed’s role as moderator, the WVU School of Journalism is helping to fulfill our mission.”

A panel of four journalists from across the state will be posing the questions to candidates. The panel includes John Hingsbergen, WV Public Broadcasting news & public affairs director; the AP’s Lawrence Messina; J. Michael Myer, executive editor of The Intelligencer/Wheeling News-Register; and Melanie Hoffman, managing editor of The Daily Athenaeum.

West Virginia Public Broadcasting is producing the program with assistance from The League of Women Voters.

Additional details can be found on West Virginia Public Broadcasting’s website at http://www.wvpubcast.org/.

-WVU-

cv/10/14/10

CONTACT: Kimberly Brown, School of Journalism
304-293-3505 ext. 5403; Kimberly.Brown@mail.wvu.edu

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