Cabrera (Arellano) No Show for Debate

The debate program for last night's broadcast on KCOS had to be changed at the last minute because District 5 candidate Rosa Cabrera (Arellano) was a no show for the debate last night.

Multiple candidates in the District 1 race indicated that Representative Noe was at the station waiting to debate Ms. Cabrera but she didn't show up.

I wasn't going to mention it at first because its hardly the first time a candidate has no-showed for a debate. Things happen. They have jobs, families, other obligations, and have to make time to talk to voters, so sometimes making it to a debate doesn't penetrate the top 10 things they care about sometimes.

So why am I writing about it?

Well, mainly for two reasons. #1 Cabrera (Arellano) has made transparency a central theme of her campaign. So if you are running on being transparent, well you should at the very least be consistent about transparency. I checked with multiple sources at the station and they confirmed that Ms. Cabrera (Arellano) is the candidate that didn't show up last night. As I said before, Noe was there and spoke to all the other candidates. They confirmed he was there.

The other reason I am writing about it is because of this social media post.

Ms. Cabrera (Arellano) indicates on Facebook that her opponent canceled.

If you recall yesterday afternoon, about 4 hours before the debate, I wrote that a source at the station indicated to me that one of the candidates canceled their appearance on the debate because they didn't want to answer questions from the moderator David Crowder.

That candidate was Rosa Cabrera (Arrellano) according to the source. I knew that yesterday, but I didn't say who it was because I wanted to see if she'd changed her mind and actually show up. I didn't see a reason to put all that out there if she was ultimately going to show up.

Its one thing to not show up to a debate. Hell, if she didn't show up because she didn't like Crowder that would've have been the first time that's happened either.

Its the public declaration of something that is factually inaccurate that I take issue with. The candidates from other races that confirmed Representative Noe was present at the debate have no reason to lie.

I spoke to Representative Noe and he said, "I did not cancel. I fully planned to go...I got a call from Crowder apologizing stating that she had canceled, she felt that Crowder was unfair to her on his coverage in 2012. Crowder says neither he nor EP Inc even reported on her. He then called her back and got her to agree. Corder then called me to say we were back on. I arrived at 7:30 for the 8pm debate."

Here's a quick run-down here. The candidates from other races and station staff confirm that Representative Noe was at the station ready to debate last night. As I mentioned yesterday, I had gotten wind early in the day that Cabrera (Arellano) didn't want to attend because she didn't want to answer questions from Crowder. If Noe had canceled, why would he show up to the station?

This isn't a misunderstanding. Someone is clearly lying.

Its either the station staff, Representative Noe, and all the District 1 candidates I spoke to, or its Ms. Cabrera (Arellano).

Cabrera (Arellano's) social media post went further. As you can see in this comment she mentioned transparency again.

Let me tell you why that is interesting. My source indicates that the reason that Cabrera (Arellano) allegedly didn't want to attend the debate last night was because she was concerned about Crowder asking her questions relating to Dame La Mano.

Dame La Mano is the giant elephant in the room no one is talking about. Ms. Cabrera (Arellano) has so far alluded to the Dame La Mano issue but hasn't directly addressed the issue. She alludes to it as a campaign stump speech when she has mentioned being bullied by the city etc.

So the thing about transparency is that you can't have it both ways. You can't run on a platform of transparency and not be transparent yourself. There's actually a few instances of when Ms. Cabrera (Arellano) has not been transparent herself. But I'll get to that in another post.

My source also indicated that Crowder went so far as to read Cabrera (Arellano) the questions he was going to ask in the debate in order to reassure her that she wasn't going to be asked about Dame La Mano.

Giving an elected official or candidates the questions in advance isn't unheard of, but it isn't practiced widely. Reporters and debate moderators hate doing that because it allows the person to craft a response and you don't always get the most genuine answer to question when that happens.

Personally when I moderate a debate or interview a candidate I don't give them the questions ahead of time either but I've done it from time-to-time to reassure a candidate. I did it just a couple weeks ago when I interview Josh Dagda.

The bottom line here is that Cabrera's (Arellano) post doesn't appear consistent with the facts. I'm sure there will be plenty of other opportunities for the two to debate and eastsiders will get an opportunity to hear from both candidates.

Hopefully the record will be set straight about the debate cancellation.