Congressman Merrill Cook's supporters say his primary election opponent, Derek Smith, is an "invisible candidate" who "refuses to engage in meaningful, public debate."
Cook dodged his own news conference Wednesday, however, and let campaign aides John Difley and Shari Holweg level the attack at Smith, who hopes to wrest the GOP nomination from Cook on June 27.
"He is a man that has no substance . . . built up by political consultants and his own money," Holweg, Cook's outreach coordinator, said of Smith.
Difley and Holweg said Smith has backed out of two debate appearances. One, sponsored by the Utah League of Credit Unions, was scheduled for June 10, but Smith canceled three days prior to the debate, they said.
Smith also refused to debate Cook at the University of Utah's Hinckley Institute of Politics, Cook's supporters said. Smith did appear in a Hinckley forum Tuesday, but not with Cook.
Difley said Smith's alleged unwillingness to debate Cook defeats the public's "right to know."
"We demand Derek Smith stop the gamesmanship, accept and actually show up in person at every debate invitation and answer the tough questions," Difley said. "To expect anything less would not be in the public interest."
Laurie Maddox, spokeswoman for the Smith campaign, said Thursday the charges are not accurate. She said Smith has not canceled a single debate appearance.
Maddox said Smith did not commit to participating in the Credit Union debate because he had other campaign events scheduled for the same time. And Smith did not decline to debate Cook at the Hinckley Institute, she said.
"First of all, we have 11 debates scheduled in a one-month period before the election. We've done three of those" with the rest to follow, Maddox said.
"Our overall response to this is that Merrill Cook is a desperate man, a very desperate man . . . He lies regularly. He's lying about this. And he's trying to cover up for the fact that we're not ducking debates, he's ducking votes in Congress."
Maddox said Cook missed an important appropriations vote Tuesday so he could be in Utah to debate Smith on radio station KTKK.
Cook's supporters acknowledged eight debates between Cook and Smith are scheduled prior to June 27, including three on television.
But Holweg said a source "close to the (Smith) campaign" indicated it is Smith's intention to cancel on those debates.
Maddox denied that accusation and called on the Cook campaign to name its source for the information.
Holweg said Smith's campaign strategy is to avoid public debates and rely on advertising. She said Smith's supporters are "riding on" a perceived lead in opinion polls.
Maddox said Smith is willing to schedule more debates with Cook. She said the campaign had hoped two more television stations would schedule debates, but those stations recently declined, she said.
Holweg said Cook chose not to appear at Wednesday's news conference, held at his campaign headquarters in downtown Salt Lake City, but did not elaborate on his reasoning. She said Cook was tending to "a matter of congressional business in the district."
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