The two main contenders for Missouri U.S. Senate finally met for a debate, joined by two minor party candidates. Republican Josh Hawley and Democrat Lucas Kunce faced off in Springfield Friday night.
On the subject of immigration, Kunce attacked Hawley’s voting record on the issue.
“We need to stop the flow of fentanyl,” Kunce said. “We have fentanyl scanners. Most of it comes through regular port of entries. Josh Hawley voted against funding fentanyl scanners and homeland security bill, and you know, he voted against the recent bill to end catch and release programs.”
Hawley called the bipartisan border bill “terrible,” saying it would have allowed 5,000 illegal immigrants a day to cross into the U.S. before border crossings would have been closed.
When asked about U.S. support for Ukraine, Hawley maintained his stance against sending the war-torn country any more aid.
“We spent, what, $200 billion on Ukraine? By the way, we haven’t tracked a penny of it,” Hawley said. “The Senate has repeatedly voted down my efforts to track every single penny of what we’re spending. We have absolutely no idea.”
Hawley and Kunce were joined on stage by Green Party nominee Nathan Kline and Jared Young of The Better Party. Kline answered the question by saying U.S. military policy has been hostile towards Russia for decades. Both Kunce and Young support sending military aid to Ukraine.
When asked about whether the U.S. should place tariffs on products from China, both Kunce and Hawley said they’re in favor of tariffs. Kline suggested that they were both hypocrites.
“While the blue team and the red team act like, you know, they’re all against each other here, they skipped hand in hand together in all these bad trade deals that have put us in this situation with China,” he said.
But Kline didn’t say whether the U.S. government should place tariffs on China, instead saying that local communities need to become self-sufficient. Young of the Better Party favors targeted tariffs against China instead of broad, wide-ranging ones. He also took aim at the two-party system that dominates both Missouri and the United States as a whole.
“Most Americans, and especially most Missourians, are completely disgusted, and exhausted, and frustrated with the state of our national politics,” Young said. “Our system is broken. Our leaders have completely lost the ability to disagree productively and engage with each other to solve problems. The two parties have decided that hatred, and anger, and contempt are their best tools for winning elections.”
The debate was sponsored by the Missouri Press Association.
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