THE KOOKS RUN THE PARTY

Clinton, Obama just say no to Fox

Presidential debate thrown into jeopardy

By MICHAEL LEARMONTH

Both Sen. Hillary Clinton and Sen. Barack Obama said they would not participate in a presidential debate sponsored by Fox News Channel, throwing the event in jeopardy.
The two senators joined former Sen. John Edwards, who announced on Friday he would not participate in the debate, one of four being held by the Congressional Black Caucus Institute.

The Congressional Black Caucus contracted with Fox to co-sponsor two of its debates -- one Democratic and one Republican -- and gave the two others to CNN.

But now the top three Democrats in the race have said they will not participate in the Democratic debate co-sponsored by Fox, which was scheduled for Sept. 23 at the Fox Theater in Detroit.

A spokesman for Obama, who is a member of the Congressional Black Caucus, told ABC News he would decline, saying "CNN seems to be a more appropriate host."

A spokesman for Clinton told Daily Variety that she was only committing to debates sanctioned by the Democratic National Committee, which the Fox debate with the CBC is not.

The Democratic party is attempting to make an issue of the perceived close ties between Fox News Channel and the Republican Party. Edwards pulled out of a Democratic debate that Fox was co-sponsoring with the Nevada Democrats, which was later cancelled.

Obama in particular has had a prickly relationship with Fox News, which in January repeated a false report that he had attended a radical Islamic school as a boy in Indonesia.

Fox clarified that report, but Fox News topper Roger Ailes incensed the Obama camp in March during remarks at the Radio and Television News Directors Foundation dinner in Washington, D.C., when he made a joke comparing Obama's name to Osama bin Laden.

In the wake of that remark, the Nevada Democrats, led by Nevada Sen. Harry Reid, cancelled the August Democratic presidential debate it had planned with Fox News.

Campaign sources told Daily Variety that Obama's withdrawal from the Congressional Black Caucus debate gives others the political cover to do the same.

Initially, many had speculated the CBC had enough clout to get Democrats to commit to the debate, even with Fox as a co-sponsor.