Republicans debating in jobs-starved Michigan

Repub­li­can pres­i­den­tial can­di­date Her­man Cain addresses the media Tues­day, Nov. 8, 2011, in Scotts­dale, Ariz. Cain said Tues­day that he would not drop his bid for the Repub­li­cans’ pres­i­den­tial nom­i­na­tion in the face of decade-old alle­ga­tions of inap­pro­pri­ate sex­ual behav­ior. (AP Photo/Matt York)

KASIE HUNT

Asso­ci­ated Press

ROCHESTER, Mich. (AP) — Together for the first time in three weeks, Repub­li­can pres­i­den­tial can­di­dates assem­bled in ail­ing Michi­gan for a debate on how they would fix the econ­omy. Also sure to come up Wednes­day night: the past week’s alle­ga­tions of sex­ual impro­pri­ety that have rocked Her­man Cain’s campaign.

Since the can­di­dates last met, the GOP nom­i­na­tion fight has been marked first by busi­ness­man Cain’s rise in national polls and then the firestorm over accu­sa­tions that he sex­u­ally harassed women dur­ing his time lead­ing the National Restau­rant Asso­ci­a­tion in the 1990s.

With less than two months until vot­ing begins in Iowa, Cain and Rom­ney will be on stage at Oak­land Uni­ver­sity with six rivals: Texas Gov. Rick Perry, for­mer House Speaker Newt Gin­grich of Geor­gia, Min­nesota Rep. Michele Bach­mann, for­mer Penn­syl­va­nia Sen. Rick San­to­rum, for­mer Utah Gov. Jon Hunts­man and Texas Rep. Ron Paul.

But Cain’s trou­bles threaten to over­shadow a dis­cus­sion, hosted by CNBC and the Michi­gan Repub­li­can Party, that’s sup­posed to cen­ter on fix­ing a strug­gling econ­omy. In Michi­gan, 11.1 per­cent are unem­ployed and the once-thriving Amer­i­can auto indus­try had all but col­lapsed before the fed­eral gov­ern­ment stepped in.

But lately, it’s been all about Cain. He’s repeat­edly tried to put the con­tro­versy to rest, doing inter­view after inter­view and finally hold­ing a news con­fer­ence Tues­day insist­ing that he would con­tinue to stand along­side his rivals despite the accusations.

Cain’s rivals have approached his trou­bles cau­tiously. In an inter­view with ABC News, how­ever, Rom­ney said the alle­ga­tions were “par­tic­u­larly dis­turb­ing” and “serious.”

“They’re going to have to be addressed,” Rom­ney said.

Hunts­man has said Cain should pro­vide a full account­ing of what hap­pened and his sit­u­a­tion is dis­tract­ing atten­tion from sub­stan­tive issues.

Cain’s insis­tence on stay­ing in the race leaves his rivals answer­ing such ques­tions — about him — while try­ing to cam­paign as usual and focus on beat­ing Pres­i­dent Barack Obama.

The Demo­c­ra­tic pres­i­dent stood out­side a fac­tory not far away last month and called gov­ern­ment bailouts of Gen­eral Motors and Chrysler a suc­cess that saved thou­sands of Amer­i­can jobs.

With Detroit — the Motor City whose for­tunes have fallen with the decline of the auto indus­try — just a few miles from the debate site, GOP can­di­dates also will have lit­tle choice but to explain their oppo­si­tion to a gov­ern­ment bailout that saved Chrysler and Gen­eral Motors and the tens of thou­sands of jobs they provide.

All eight Repub­li­cans par­tic­i­pat­ing in the debate say they wouldn’t have offered gov­ern­ment loans to save the two auto giants.

Posted by AP News on Nov 9 2011. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.