Most Long Island congressional candidates won't have debates, part of growing trend

WASHINGTON — Three of Long Island's four U.S. congressional races this election won't have candidate debates, with two incumbents and even one challenger declining to publicly spar with their foes.

Strategists, former Long Island Congress members and analysts said this reflects a disturbing trend, locally and nationally, because voters need opportunities to hear candidates articulate differences on issues, side by side, and watch how they react on their feet and defend their positions in real time.

"We feel it is a great benefit for people to hear and see candidates debate, but these opportunities are unfortunately decreasing," said Barbara Epstein, of Wantagh, co-president of the East Nassau League of Women Voters.

But candidates who declined debates disputed their necessity. They said they are instead using their time talking to voters at events face-to-face and, for incumbents, also concentrating on their public service on behalf of Long Island voters.

"For the last six years, I’ve worked every day to deliver real results for Long Island, and I believe voters should judge me on that record — not on 30-second sound bites in a staged debate," Rep. Andrew Garbarino (R-Bayport) explained in a statement. "I’m focused on the job I was elected to do, not political theater."

There were as many as five debates among three of the Long Island congressional races in both 2022 and 2024. And former Island congressional members recall years with far more.

But this year, only one has been set before the Nov. 3 election. Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-Glen Cove) and former GOP Assemb. Michael LiPetri, of Farmingdale, are readying for a cable TV faceoff to be taped on Oct. 20 and shown afterward.

Safer bet, but 'undermining democracy'

There is harm in this decline, according to experts, such as University of Michigan debate director Aaron Kall, co-author of "Debating the Donald." They said voters are deprived of invaluable previews of how candidates would conduct themselves on the job, including navigating serious, unforeseen crises. "If a candidate can't survive a one-hour unscripted debate, this is likely a warning sign for future vulnerabilities they would face once in office," Kall said.

Others, like Gibbs Knotts, a Coastal Carolina University political scientist who has written about political debates, pointed blame for the fading of an American political ritual at the ascension of social media as being a safer avenue of direct communication with voters for risk-averse candidates eager to avoid debate-stage gaffes or negative viral moments.

"Debates come with significant risks, especially for candidates who are leading in the polls or represent districts that strongly favor one party," he added. "Part of it is simply that more races are less competitive than they once were," leaving front-runners little incentive to take part.

"There’s no question it’s undermining democracy, but the safest bet for a candidate is to control your own narrative on your own terms," said former Long Island Democratic Rep. Steve Israel, whose House career from 2001 to 2017 included a period of leading the national Democrats’ campaign arm. "Tragically, candidate debates in the House are becoming as quaint as a Norman Rockwell painting," Israel suggested.

There’s been minimal academic or other study of the actual changing frequency or decline of debating in congressional races — a 2022 analysis by the Brookings Institution did use a sampling of states in finding debates in competitive U.S. Senate races had declined steadily from 2010 to 2022. But Kall, Knotts and others said it’s happening.

Of course, debates are far from extinct. For instance, in the hotly contested race for New York's 17th Congressional District, in the lower Hudson Valley, incumbent Republican Rep. Mike Lawler (R-Pearl River) and Democratic challenger Cait Conley already have participated in the first of two scheduled debates.

But on Long Island, two of the four U.S. House incumbents are refusing to debate. And in a flip of the more-common script, the third incumbent, Rep. Nick LaLota (R-Amityville), seen by nonpartisan experts as the favorite, wants to debate, but his challenger, Democrat Chris Gallant, of Amity Harbor, is refusing.

Campaigning alternatives

Former Long Island Republican Reps. Rick Lazio and Pete King both said they viewed debates against their opponents as important.

"I felt it was my duty and responsibility to provide voters with an opportunity to hear an unvarnished and unedited open debate that spoke to the issues," Lazio, a House member from 1993 to 2001, said in an email.

Though his stroll across the debate stage toward Hillary Clinton during their 2000 U.S. Senate contest was perceived by some as ignobly menacing and still stands as a memorable political debate gaffe, Lazio said he remains "strongly in favor of public debates."

King, who served in the House from 1993 to 2021, said he, too, accepted most debate invitations because, "first, we owe it to the voters." He added, "To me, there is also the danger of being attacked for not doing the debate. ... I think people sort of measure you by how you stand up when you're actually in the public eye."

But first-term Rep. Laura Gillen (D-Rockville Centre) explained through a spokesperson, Eric Jones, that she has not accepted invitations to debate her challenger, Hempstead Town Receiver of Taxes Jeanine Driscoll, of Bellerose Village, because she "holds a large number of meetings and events directly with voters, which she will keep doing through Election Day." Gillen did debate in 2022 for the open congressional seat, and then again in 2024 when she was a challenger.

"Laura Gillen is refusing to debate because she cannot defend the indefensible," Driscoll said in a statement. She pointed to votes Gillen has taken on taxes, Social Security benefits and other matters.

Garbarino’s Democratic challenger, former Suffolk County Executive Patrick Halpin, of Oak Beach, made it clear he is ready to debate Garbarino "anytime, anyplace."

And Gallant, whose campaign has been roiled by the release of explicit photos he had modeled for, also confirmed in a statement he won’t be debating: "I am spending every minute of the next four weeks talking to voters face to face — not quibbling over process points." Gallant offered, "Notice that the attacks against me aren't coming after my politics, my policies, or what I've said I want to do for this district."

LaLota responded that it's policy positions, in fact, that he wants to debate Gallant over, from immigration enforcement to the Electoral College.

"If my opponent won’t defend his positions on Long Island, how can voters trust him to win the fights we need won in Washington?" LaLota asked in an emailed statement. "Debating opposing views is part of the job."