Oregon’s leading candidates for governor sparred over the state’s most serious challenges Wednesday, in a wide-ranging debate that offered few fireworks but plenty of policy focus.
In the hourlong meeting in Medford, Democratic Gov. Tina Kotek and Republican state Sen. Christine Drazan took the central issues animating this year’s race — affordability, struggling schools, homelessness and data centers among them.
The event marked the second time Drazan and Kotek have debated this year. It was hosted by KOBI5, Medford’s NBC TV affiliate, and featured questions from the station’s Salem bureau chief, Craig Smullin, news director Joe Sullivan, and Rick Bailey, president of Southern Oregon University.
Unlike their previous meeting, the two candidates never directly addressed one another or pressed for time to rebut the others’ points in detail. But there was plenty of disagreement, and the debate was sharpest when the candidates took on issues of taxes and costs of living that polling shows are at the top of voters’ minds.
Asked whether she’d push for any changes to the tax code if she wins another term, Kotek didn’t answer outright. She told moderators that the state needs money to fund public services, but that “if we can tweak some things to make sure we’re more competitive” she would try.
A Prosperity Council convened by Kotek earlier this year has called for a study on ways to overhaul the state’s tax code to ensure it’s attractive for businesses and other taxpayers.
Drazan, meanwhile, pledged to reduce taxes, while not explaining how she’d convince a Democratically-controlled Legislature to go along with that plan. She blasted Kotek for approving a raft of new taxes in her first term.
“Now let’s go through the list,” Drazan said. “There’s a Zyn tax. There’s an insurance tax. There is a paycheck tax. There’s a car tax. On and on and on and on. There’s a paddleboard tax.”
Moderators pressed both women on whether they’d change Oregon’s tax on the estates of people who die, which kicks in for estates worth more than $1 million, the lowest threshold of any state in the nation. Lawmakers have toyed with the idea of tweaking the law for years.
Kotek said she is open to altering the formula behind the tax, provided Oregon could do so without losing money. “We have to be clear that when we change any taxes, we have to make sure we can pay for the basics that we have,” she said.
Drazan pledged to push for the law’s repeal.
Both candidates were also asked how to prevent businesses from leaving the state, a sore point in Southern Oregon after Dutch Bros announced it would decamp from Grants Pass for Arizona.
Drazan suggested she’d adopt a hard sales approach to economic development that Oregon has long eschewed. “When businesses say that they are thinking about leaving, I will say, ‘What do you need to stay? Let’s solve those problems. Let’s lower those barriers,’” she said.
Kotek nodded to a bill she passed earlier this year that will create a system to fast-track permitsfor major industrial developments.
“Oregon just can’t sit back and rest on our benefits of living in the state,” Kotek said. “We have to work harder to recruit, retain, and keep our businesses.”
The race for governor appears tight. A poll commissioned by OPB found that Drazan had a one-point lead on Kotek among likely voters, well within the survey’s 3.24% margin of error.
Kotek has based much of her sales pitch this year on Oregonians’ antipathy for Trump, suggesting Drazan would move in lockstep with the president to advance a conservative agenda if allowed into the governor’s office.
Drazan has insisted she would be independent, and has attempted to turn broad voter dissatisfaction against Kotek, whom polling suggests is only marginally more popular than the president. Drazan has accused Kotek of advancing policies that have raised prices while hurting the state’s quality of life.
Those themes were omnipresent throughout Wednesday’s debate, such as when Kotek and Drazan were also asked about changes to SNAP benefits that provide federal food assistance to poor individuals and families.
As of June, 126,000 fewer Oregonians were receiving those benefits compared to the same time last year — in large parts because of more frequent eligibility checks and other changes passed by the Trump administration.
Drazan, who has said her family relied on food stamps when she was a child, said she supported SNAP. But she criticized state leaders for allowing Oregon to have a relatively high error rate when it comes to awarding benefits.
“We have problems when it comes to approving our people that are eligible for SNAP benefits,” she said. “We need to ensure that we communicate well with the people that are on these benefits that need them, and ensure that they’re ready to maintain eligibility.”
Kotek, meanwhile, tore into the Trump administration policy, recounting how she’d directed state money to provide food assistance to families during a government shutdown last year.
“I’m always going to stand up for the folks who need a little bit of help, who are working, who are trying to create a life for themselves,” she said.
When moderators asked how each candidate would improve Oregon’s underperforming schools, Kotek suggested progress was underway. The governor passed a bill last year that gives the state more leverage to intervene when schools don’t meet certain benchmarks.
But Kotek also pledged to do more, saying she would find money to fund more instructional time in the state’s K-12 schools in her next budget. The governor’s campaign platform includes a goal of getting Oregon up to the national average of instructional time by the end of her second term.
Kotek also attacked Drazan for favoring vouchers that she said would “take your public tax dollars out of our K-12 public system and give it to folks to go to private schools. “I don’t believe in that. I don’t think that’s how we support all of our students.”
Drazan panned Kotek’s approach as inadequate. “Continuing down the path of more of the same with incremental commitments to change can’t be believed, because the path that we’ve been on has been nothing but failure,” she said.
Among other subjects the debate touched on were matters of special importance in Southern Oregon, including the fate of Ashland-based Southern Oregon University, headwinds faced by rural healthcare providers, and how to stem the impact of wildfires that frequently rage through the area.
Despite the two candidates’ differences, there were moments of agreement in the debate.
Both women said plainly they did not favor a sales tax. Both would press for a moratorium on new data centers. And while ducking a question about where they’d trim Oregon’s budget, both named a small implement they’d use to do so.
Kotek chose a scalpel in her metaphorical budget exercise, Drazan chose a fine-toothed comb.
