COLORADO SPRINGS — With three weeks to go until ballots are sent out in the all-mail primary election that will determine who will represent the 5th Congressional District, Robert Blaha, a boisterous businessman whose deep pockets have made him a viable challenger, says he has asked incumbent U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn to a debate on more than 16 different occasions.
Will they debate, or won’t they?
Lamborn’s response has been, for the most part, unresponsive.
His spokeswoman, Catherine Mortensen, said Monday: “Mr. Blaha has said he doesn’t have a problem with the congressman’s voting record. As far as we’re concerned, there’s nothing to debate. Lamborn is not interested in a debate over personalities.”
In past primaries, the three-term Republican congressman faced several challengers but never a one-on-one matchup.
When it comes to congressional contests in the 5th District, November is irrelevant, because no Democrat or independent has ever held the seat in this über-conservative central pocket of the state.
Blaha says Lamborn owes it to his constituents to debate him. “One of the tenets that makes America so great is that we value the opportunity to have a battle of ideas and to elect the best possible representation of those ideas,” he said.
