Three Debates, Zero Hope

Virginia, New Jersey and New York are set to vote, as candidates trade barbs

It’s day 21 of the government shutdown, and there’s no sign of discussion or debate in Washington to get the government back open. So I did what any political observer might do: I looked to the states for inspiration. Maybe there I could find the debate about our future that we so badly need, I thought.

Big mistake.

If the candidate debates I watched are anything to go on, the bitter toxicity of Washington has metastasized. In just three weeks, Virginia and New Jersey will elect new governors and New York City will elect a new mayor. I watched the final debates in all three races hoping to find something. Substance. Vision. Any hint of the better politics we claim to want.

Instead I found that both aggressive partisanship and unseriousness are no longer contained to cable news or congressional hearings. It’s embedded in state-level races, normalized in our political discourse, and apparently, we’ve decided this is acceptable.

The Format Is Broken

In Virginia, Republican Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears and Democratic Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger are vying to become the state’s first female governor. The stakes are real: Virginia’s economy is slowing, its housing costs are soaring, and the federal shutdown has a disproportionate impact on the state’s residents. These issues demand serious discussion.

What we got instead was a masterclass in disruption.

Earle-Sears refused to let Spanberger complete a single answer without interruption. “Abigail,” she would interject, then ignore the question posed to her and ask one of her own.

Spanberger tried to stay on the question the moderator asked, and did try to differentiate herself in the moment of bitter politics, saying she didn’t want candidates calling each other “the enemy.”

If that was her goal, however, it was nearly impossible to hear many of her answers over Earle-Sears’ constant interruptions. That’s precisely the problem. When one candidate can simply shout over another, we learn nothing about either.

The Nastiness Seems Deliberate

New Jersey’s Gubernatorial debate between Democratic Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill and Republican Jack Ciattarelli descended into mudslinging over decades-old grievances.

Ciattarelli, whose campaign has been accused of leaking Sherrill’s military records, attacked Sherrill over events from her Naval Academy days in 1994, more than 30 years ago. Sherrill fired back, accusing Ciattarelli of causing tens of thousands of deaths through his medical publishing work, suggesting he covered for pharmaceutical companies promoting opioids.

“Shame on you,” Ciattarelli shot back.

“Shame on you,” Sherrill retorted.

The real shame in this back and forth is that as they debated their histories they didn’t spend that time talking about what they wanted for the future.

Ciattarelli, who has spent a decade running for governor, is now threatening to sue his opponent for defamation. This is where we are: litigation as campaign strategy.

The only consensus to emerge in New Jersey? If you find yourself driving through the Garden State, you won’t need to pump your own gas anytime soon. Both candidates want to maintain the state’s ban on self-service gas stations. At least there’s that.

Prioritizing Voters’ Concerns

New York’s mayoral debate featured Democrat Zohran Mamdani, independent Andrew Cuomo, and Republican Curtis Sliwa (who noted he wasn’t wearing his signature red beret).

Mamdani accused Cuomo of wanting to evict him. Cuomo accused Mamdani of not being a real Democrat. Sliwa complained that both men were ignoring him.

Yet amid the chaos, something revealing happened: When asked about the top two categories among 38 million calls New Yorkers made to 311, Mamdani, the youngest candidate, was the only candidate who correctly identified one of them — noise complaints.

Sliwa guessed potholes and rats. Cuomo guessed homeless and trash. The actual top two: noise and illegal parking. Mamdani was correct about New Yorkers’ concerns, despite Cuomo’s claims of having decades more experience. Cuomo’s decades of experience, Mamdani noted in the debate, have cost New York taxpayers more than $60 million in legal fees for Cuomo’s various legal defenses, including over $21 million related to sexual harassment allegations alone.

Here’s what’s instructive: on some issues, there’s actual agreement we refuse to acknowledge. Both Donald Trump and Mamdani say they support prioritizing mental health treatment for Americans. But if you suggested they agreed with each other, both would likely howl in protest. Democrats are running away from Trump while Republicans, even those like New Jersey’s Jack Ciattarelli who previously disavowed him, are sprinting toward him.

Red Meat Over Real Issues

The debate questions themselves reveal our dysfunction.

In Virginia, moderators asked whether girls should share locker rooms with transgender athletes, not about young people’s economic futures or educational outcomes.

In New York, candidates were asked whether they’d purchased anything from marijuana dispensaries (two of three had), not about the marijuana industry’s impact or legalization’s effects on the city. They were also asked whether they would boycott any parades.

In New Jersey, one question was what grade they’d give President Trump, as if we’re running a report card business rather than selecting leadership in the state.

What we’re left with is more of the same.

Many of us say we want to end toxic politics. We bemoan incivility and yearn for substantive debate. We’re not owning the reality staring back at us, though. If anything, we’ve normalized viciousness. We’ve apparently accepted litigation threats as campaign tactics. We’ve allowed debate formats that reward interruption over insight.

To be fair, glimpses of substance did emerge.

Some candidates discussed energy security, energy independence, and education. It’s also entirely possible these politicians have more depth than these bitter brawls allowed them to display. I certainly hope so. Because if this is all we’re getting after 21 days of government shutdown and what feels like a never-ending election cycle where we’re voting every single year, it’s going to be a long 3 years ahead.

In three weeks, New Jersey, Virginia, and New York voters will make their choices, hopefully with a functioning federal government restored. (A girl can dream).

Maybe these are the candidates people wanted. Maybe this is the politics we’ve chosen. I’m not sure, but what I can say is that until we demand better, both from our moderators and from ourselves as an audience, nothing will change.

The view from the states is clear: bitter politics isn’t just contagious. It’s becoming who we are.