WNDU-TV - Packed House for First and Only Walorski-Bock Debate

News Article

By Megan Hickey

Wabash, Ind. A contentious battle took stage before a packed house Tuesday night, as Indiana's candidates for the Second District come together for their first face-to-face debate.

Representative Jackie Walorski and challenger Joe Bock met at the Dallas Winchester Senior Center in Wabash, Ind.

Debate Format

The debate lasted less than an hour and covered topics ranging from healthcare, unemployment, immigration reform, energy issues and terror threats overseas.

The moderator was a local attorney and the group of panelists included editors from local Wabash newspapers. They posed five questions to the candidates and the rest of the questions were submitted by audience members.

Top Issues Facing U.S.

One audience question asked for the top three issues facing the country today.

"Job creation, balanced budget, national security," Walorski responded, in part. "I made a promise when I went to Congress that the first piece of legislation that I would file would be a balanced budget amendment and I did. Hoosiers know more than anybody in the country balanced budgets create jobs."

Bock said, "In northern Indiana, the top issue is jobs. We also have a lot of challenges with healthcare obviously and a lot of people have been grappling with that. I would say in addition we have a threat of terrorism in this country that we need to address. It's our very real national security threat here on the horizon."

Skyrocketing Prices

Another audience question asked how the candidates would combat skyrocket food, fuel and medical care costs.

"I would say that the federal government needs to focus more on income inequality," Bock said. "It needs to focus more on making sure that we don't lose our middle class and if we do that then these kinds of things will be addressed on their own. I don't think we want the federal government to start regulating the marketplace, I think that that's too much intrusion, but I do think that people need to have good paying high quality jobs."

"Hyper over regulation is costing consumers money because all of that regulation all of that overload of costs comes right down to us when we go to the store and we purchase this or that," Walorski said. "The other issue is tax reform. You know, you've heard I think pretty leading indication that in the beginning of January both the House and the Senate -- and it sounds like with the likelihood of the president's support -- are going to engage in tax reform."

Lead up to Election

The debate was sponsored by the Wabash County Chamber of Commerce and the Farm Bureau of Wabash County.

It's the only scheduled debate between the main party candidates before the November 4 election.

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