Paul Hammel
Nebraska Examiner
LINCOLN — The candidates in a special election to fill the vacancy left by the resignation of U.S. Rep. Jeff Fortenberry differed on the need for “red-flag” laws, arming school teachers and what’s wrong with Washington, D.C., in a televised debate Sunday night.
State Sen. Mike Flood of Norfolk, the Republican in the June 28 special election, said he supports better fortification of public schools and would support arming teachers, if a local school board agreed.
Flood said he supports Americans’ right to bear arms and is seeking “common sense” solutions in the wake of mass shootings in Uvalde, Texas, and Buffalo, N.Y.
His Democratic opponent, State Sen. Patty Pansing Brooks of Lincoln, said that more needs to be done, saying she supports “red-flag” laws that allow judges, after a court hearing, to confiscate the guns of a person having a mental breakdown or making threatening statements.
Pansing Brooks said she opposes arming teachers, saying “good guys with guns” failed to stop the carnage, “for whatever reason,” at the elementary school in Uvalde.
Sunday’s debate, broadcast by Omaha television station KETV, is the only debate scheduled prior to the June 28 special election in eastern Nebraska’s 1st Congressional District. The winner will fill out the remainder of Fortenberry’s term, which ends in January.
Fortenberry convicted
Fortenberry, a Lincoln Republican who had represented the 1st District since 2005, announced his resignation in March, two days after he was convicted of three felony counts of lying to federal investigators after a weeklong federal trial in Los Angeles.
Regardless of who wins the special election, both Flood and Pansing Brooks will represent their respective parties in the November general election after winning in the May 10 primary election. The victor will earn a two-year term in Congress.
What’s wrong with Congress emerged as a repeated issue during the one-hour debate.
Flood, 47, who owns a Norfolk-based media company, laid the blame squarely on “one party,” the Democrats, ruling Congress and the White House in Washington, D.C.
“It’s clear that America is on the wrong path, and we need a change in leadership,” Flood said. “I want to end the one-party control of Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi. … She wants to go full-steam ahead.”
‘Wrong path’
“If you want to go the same path, vote for her,” Flood said.
Pansing Brooks, 63, who runs a Lincoln law firm with her husband, said that hyperpartisanship is the problem in Congress and that neither political party has all the answers. She said the answers come from both parties working together.
“I’ve said one-party rule isn’t working, we have to come together,” Pansing Brooks said. “We’re tired of the grenade launching. We’re tired of parties fighting each other instead of finding solutions.”
At one point, Pansing Brooks accused Flood of “putting words in my mouth” about voting to retain Pelosi as speaker.
She said she has not made such a commitment, adding that she hasn’t met with her party’s leadership, unlike Flood, who recently was the beneficiary of a visit to Nebraska by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif.
Pipeline is ‘old news’
The two candidates also split on the decision by President Biden to block the Keystone XL pipeline.
Flood said he would rather get energy from a friendly neighbor like Canada than from places like Russia, where a “true killer,” President Vladimir Putin, has cut off energy to some countries who are opposing his war in Ukraine.
But Pansing Brooks called Keystone XL “old news,” saying that its oil was headed overseas and that leaks from the pipeline could have fouled the Ogallala Aquifer, which underlies much of the state.
Flood said that when he was Speaker of the Nebraska Legislature, he brokered a compromise that rerouted the pipeline around Nebraska’s fragile Sand Hills.
“Not everyone can afford a Tesla. We need to have options in energy security,” Flood said.
Pansing Brooks said that America needs to look at all options for energy, including wind, solar and hydrogen, pointing out that Toyota plans to build cars that run on hydrogen.
What we need in Nebraska is diversity of energy,” she said.
