COLUMBUS: Democratic U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown and Republican challenger Josh Mandel are set to meet Thursday in the second of their three campaign debates.
The faceoff is expected to be lively because the two exchanged insults in their first meeting Monday. They sparred over issues that have played out on a barrage of TV commercials in one of America’s most costly and closely watched U.S. Senate contests.
Thursday’s debate is scheduled for 8 p.m.
The auto bailout was a highlight of the first debate — in Cleveland, the heart of northeast Ohio, where both men reside.
Mandel finally made clear he would have opposed the government rescue of the auto industry, a move Brown supported and has made a linchpin of his campaign.
“I’m not a bailout senator,” Mandel told a raucous crowd that peppered the exchange with boos and cheers. “He’s the bailout senator.”
Brown points to 800,000 auto-related Ohio jobs that were saved by keeping General Motors Co. and Chrysler LLC afloat. He said opposing the move in a state like Ohio “just boggles the mind.”
Mandel, 35, is Ohio’s treasurer. He was a Cleveland-area city councilman and state legislator before winning the seat two years ago. Brown, 59, is a former Ohio secretary of state who was elected to the U.S. House in 1992 and is serving his first term in the Senate.
Brown’s defeat of Republican Mike DeWine six years ago surprised political prognosticators — and has remained a loss the GOP would like to reverse.
That 2006 victory made Brown the first Democrat that Ohioans had sent to the Senate since former astronaut John Glenn retired in 1999.
Brown is among the Senate’s most liberal members, while Mandel’s positions on national policy issues have been sometimes difficult to discern during the campaign. Polls have consistently shown Brown with a slight lead.
Former Bush operative Karl Rove’s American Crossroads, the affiliated Crossroads GPS, and the U.S. Chamber have spent tens of millions of dollars against Brown in the state. Mandel attack ads have come largely from labor-backed groups who favor Brown.
