LEXINGTON, Ky. (LEX 18) — The long-awaited first faceoff between Attorney General Daniel Cameron and former U.S. Ambassador Kelly Craft ended in personal attacks and criticisms on Monday night.
Five of the top Republican candidates for governor appeared in the 90-minute debate hosted by Kentucky Educational Television. Cameron and Craft are the frontrunners in the primary race, according to polling. Agriculture Commissioner Ryan Quarles, Mayor of Somerset Alan Keck, and Northern Kentucky attorney Eric Deters also qualified for the debate.
Craft and Cameron - and the PACs that are backing them - have already gone negative against each other in political ads. And the claims made in many of those ads were brought up on stage on Monday.
Craft attacked Cameron and Bluegrass Freedom Action, a group that supports Cameron’s election effort, for taking more than $100,000 in donations from Pace-o-Matic, a “gray machine” manufacturer. She claims this happened as the company sues Kentucky in an attempt to overturn a newly passed ban on gray machines.
Cameron, whose office is defending the law in court, said that he has recused himself from the case. However, a Craft supporter has filed an ethics complaint over the situation.
Cameron called the allegations "bogus."
“Kelly has not done her homework,” Cameron said. “Kelly was desperate, and again, this has all come about because... Kelly, you spent six months telling folks that you were going to get the Donald Trump endorsement. You had him at the Derby last year. And then I got the endorsement. And your team has been scrambling ever since.”
After the debate, Cameron said the endorsement means Trump "believes that I am best equipped to win not only this nomination, but be the next governor of Kentucky."
Craft has previously said Trump "did not make a choice" because she "was not in the race" at the time.
Cameron and Craft also fought over law enforcement support.
After Craft attacked Cameron for allowing the Department of Justice to come into Louisville to investigate patterns and practices of the Louisville Metro Police Department, Cameron attacked her lack of law enforcement endorsements.
“Kelly has been sitting with law enforcement and has got one to openly and publicly support her,” Cameron said. “I’ve gotten over 100 law enforcement officials that have supported me, endorsed this campaign for governor. I’m going to continue to fight for them whether Kelly Craft spends $10 million attacking me or not.”
He also brought up allegations that Craft's husband gave money to a PAC.
"As I understand, you have a coordination issue with your husband, Joe Craft, and that's under investigation right now," Cameron said.
"We are going to leave my husband out of it," responded Craft before the moderator redirected her attention.
Deters, who experts describe as a conservative firebrand, quickly jumped in to attack Craft on that too.
"You try to buy politicians," said Deters. You're trying to buy Kentucky. And it's not going to work."
After Monday's debate, Craft called the attacks on her "desperate."
"Obviously, the table to my right was pretty desperate," Craft said. “I was hoping that it would be civil discourse because we owe the state of Kentucky. We owe it to them to be their voice.”
Addressing Deters' barbs, Craft said: "There's a clown in every circus and we certainly had one sitting with us tonight."
During the attacks, Quarles and Keck mostly took a backseat.
Keck voiced his frustration saying, “Quite honestly, the last 10 minutes are why people are sick of politics in America."
“It’s ‘he said, she said, we’re gonna spend a pile of money to tear each other down.’ I want a Kentucky where we lift each other up and get stuff done," said Keck.
"I think Kentuckians are sick of business as usual and politics as usual," Keck added after the debate.
Quarles believes the chaos gave him the opportunity to show voters that he has “a temperament that Kentucky needs to see."
He made it clear that focusing on “issues not insults" is part of his campaign's approach.
“It’s important that Republicans nominate a candidate who can unite the party,” said Quarles. “There’s no problem with having disagreements on issues and policies and voting records, etc., but it’s important that if we’re going to defeat Andy Beshear, we need to nominate somebody who wants to help lift other people up and unite the party after May 16.”
