Moderated byill be four broadcast political reporters. Good evening from that tbw studios in olympia. To all of you watching across the state, from spokane to ocean isla, to walla walla, lets bring in our two candidates, and come at it governor jay inslee and police chief lauren culp. Tonight, i need an affirmative you can hear us from the studio . Yes. Yes. Wonderful and we want to let viewers know at home the candidates are alone in those rooms and upstairs from us here in the studios. There are no Campaign Staffers allowed in there, no members of production crew are in the rooms with them they also were not allowed to bring in notes or cell phones or computers. It is just them in their and the candidates to have screens where they can see each other. They can see us, the moderators. And they can see that digital time cues. Im going to go over the format for tonights debate, different from last weeks president ial debate. We begin with Opening Statements. Questions will be asked about candidates will have timed answers and rebuttals. The moderator may ask a followup question and we will end with closing statements. Candidates agree they will not interrupt each other. We the moderators will enforce the rules. As you watch the debate we invite you to join the conversation on social media using the waelex. With that, it is time for Opening Statements. We have flipped a coin. Lauren culp will go first. You have two minutes. Lauren thank you and welcome to everyone. Thank you to the moderators. Thank you to the governor for agreeing to this although i would have purported to be on the same stage. Preferred for it to be on the same stage. I appreciate all cooperation to get this done. This is the most important debate the state is going to have for the next four years in our state. Here in washington we have a leadership crisis. I have been in leadership positions my entire life i served in the United States army. I was a sergeant. I went through drill sergeant school. I also went through that noncommissioned officers academy. I was an honor graduate from the noncommissioned officers academy. I was also an honor graduate from my advanced individual training class. I trained civilians into being soldiers. After my military service in the 101st Airborne Division i went into the civilian workforce i learned the Building Trades and worked in the olympia area right where we are now. I worked for other people for three or four years and then in 1988 i started my own Construction Business working right out of libya, right here. I built that up from nothing ran it over 20 years and then realized my childhood dream in 2010, and became a Police Officer. Ive been in leadership positions my entire life. I have three different careers where ive been in leadership and this state is in a leadership crisis right now. You can tell that by the governor just taking a big pay raise and saying that he cant control that. Well he can issue executive , orders to affect your pay and your job and your business but apparently he cant issue an executive order to stop his own pay raise. So thats a little bit onesided and i think we need some strong leadership and we need someone whos going to represent we the people and stand up for citizens rights. Thank you very much. Thank you, mr. Culp. Governor inslee, two minutes. Thank you and im delighted to be here tonight with a coalition and achieve. The seattle are world champions. And that we can have a discussion about why our state should be confident we cant defeat the covid pandemic. And that we can rebuild our economy. Fundamentally the reason we should be confident is because of the extraordinary work we have done together in the last few years. It is extraordinary. We have done great work in health care, for the Health Care Needs of our people. 800,000 people now having insurance. And now having started the first public option in the United States. Working people have needed help and we have produced extraordinary benefits with the best pay, family and medical leave policy in the United States the highest minimum wage , and the best overtime rules. Our children obviously need a great education and we should be proud that weve accomplished the best most generous financial , aid program for our College Students and apprenticeships , programs for those going into the skilled trades. We have accomplished so much in clean energy. But tonight we have a bigger question to answer, and that is are we going to step up and , fight the covid pandemic . Or are we going to belittle it, ignore it, and in some sense surrender to it . I feel strongly we have to stand up, face this and beat this , virus into the ground. We have to do smart things including wearing a mask and social distancing because we know that these things work and when we follow science in washington, as we do, good things happen. We are a scienceoriented state and we can use our science and our heads and beat this virus. And the reason is so we can reopen our economy and im looking forward to that so lets get started. Inslee, questions, the topic is covid19. Chief culp, the first question for you. President trumps covid19 diagnosis wrought out well wishes and renewed criticism he does not take the buyers kerrys late. You have faced the same criticism. You called the mask mandate a quote bunch of crap you continue to hold Large Campaign rallies where hundreds of people are in attendance. What do you say to those who believe that your approach would not only kill more people but would prolong the pandemic . You have one minute and 15 seconds. Out andlp i never came spoke against Wearing Masks i came out against the the direction and the order from the government a Public Servant that , sits in the Governors Office. Everyone in government whether appointed or elected are Public Servants and i firmly believe in individual freedom and liberty i believe in safety, obviously. I have been working in Public Safety for the last 10 years. The problem is when we have one , person sitting in the Governors Office telling everyone what theyre going to wear, whether theyre going to go to work or whether theyre not going to go to work. Thats the problem that ive had with this and as governor i would put out the information with medical professionals tell everyone whats going on what they should do to protect themselves and what might happen if they dont and make sure the supply chain is open for the equipment thats needed and then let free individual citizens decide whats best for themselves their family and their business because you cant tell me that a barber with one customer in his store cant cut that persons hair safely and protect him and his customers but a Marijuana Store or an Abortion Clinic or a Big Box Store is okay to open with a hundred or two hundred people in it. That is not common sense and its lacking in the governors right now. And i will bring that to olympia. And remember we will have , time for rebuttals and followups but first governor but he appeared first, governor inslee, to you. Washingtonians have now been mandates forcovid more than 200 days they were told first to stay home stay healthy three months ago you told them that if they messed up if they masked up we could , open up in may you introduced a phasedin approach to reopen the economy called safe start but just two months after that it paused indefinitely and despite announcing just one day before this debate that you would start to lift more restrictions because weve made progress counties still cant move into the next phase. Why should voters after seven months believe that you have a coherent plan to reopen the state . You have one minute and 15 seconds. Gov. Inslee its really quite simple it is because we are saving washingtonians lives by the hundreds maybe the thousands. Theres been 210,000 people whove lost their lives in america over 2 000 in the state of washington and our fundamental duty is to save those lives and theres good news here because this is working. This is working big time im pleased to share with my fellow washingtonians that tonight what we have done in our social distancing, in our masking campaign because washingtonians are not listening to donald trump and frankly, chief culp. They are wearing mass they are they are Wearing Masks. They are social distancing. And as a result of that we have lowered our infection rate dramatically. Tonight we are fortunate. 45 other states in the United States have higher infection numbers, some that are five or 10 times more than the state of washington. This translates for people going home with their families parents being able to see their children, grandparents. That i think still have value i believe in this society their lives will be saved and we are opening in our economy weve been doing that for two months. Weve opened all kinds of bowling alleys, more restaurant activity, wedding parlors,and that will continue in the next few weeks. , chief called jeff chief culp you have the first chance at rebuttal here i do want you to speak specifically you know weve talked about the governors mandates do you believe that the governors mandates have ultimately saved lives and you have 45 seconds to to respond to the governors answer. Yes, he claims that his mandates are saving lives but the federal government set the state approximately 29 per patient per day in our Nursing Homes and we know by the by the uh data that those are the most vulnerable among us is the People Living in Nursing Homes the elderly over 61 percent of the people who have died have been in Nursing Homes the federal government sent 29 per patient per day for Nursing Homes for extra staff extra equipment and this governor said no were not sending them twenty nine Dollars Per Day for extra staff and extra equipment in Nursing Homes. Were only sending them five dollars a day. I would like to know where the rest of that money is going because it it came up to about 41 Million Dollars i believe uh. Governor i want to give you a chance to rebuttal here to what uh chief culp has said and i also want you to just weigh in you know he talks a lot about the constitution and that being his guidebook for how hed handle this and how hed govern in general so can you just touch on also in your response how you use the constitution, the state constitution when you go about putting some of these mandates down and making these decisions. Gov. Inslee well i follow the , constitution in all its respects and ive done that in this ive done this in gun safety and we have saved lives. This is this is scientifically proven theres no debate about this it is clear for donald trump and and uh chief culp to deny that is really trade extraordinary. The Scientific Community is clear it has saved thousands of lives and more importantly it will save thousands and more lives in this country and in this state if we continue this course. No court, no court has struck down any of my decisions that are obviously controversial look this has been hard on people. Saving lives sometimes is not easy. People have had all kinds of difficulties in their lives in their businesses. But it unequivocally has shown we had an infection disease doctor yesterday check his testimony out, he will tell you. I want to talk about boeing. Governor inslee, you have said boeing threatened you. Mug you. To get the largest tax break for a corporation in Washington State history. You personally called for a special session years ago to get 8. 7 billion dollars in tax incentives in exchange for the production of the 77x line but now boeing as you know is moving the entire 787 production line from everett to north charleston, south carolina. Did you get fooled . Gov. Inslee no. In fact we built into that , agreement things that had not been built in the 787 deal that was done before i was governor. And they are not building a second line for the triple seven uh so no uh we made a decision about jobs im all about jobs and i come from surrounded by boeing families in in my cousins and my my best friends growing up and i believe that these these planes should be made here we have the best workers in in the world on this to go elsewhere did not make sense and if it did make sense the thing that is most disappointing to me is that the company did not give us any way to consider bringing them back when Market Conditions improve. Look i can read i know that the , market has been down for airplanes, but this market is going to come back and when it comes back the boeing Company Needs to treat taxpayers fairly. So we need to look at their tax breaks to act in a responsible way, so that they have an incentive to bring these jobs back and make sure the next airplane is made here as well. I believe that should happen both because its the best place to make airplanes according to the teal group and its a fair treatment of washington citizens. And i think we should ask for that. Lauren culp youve talked , about your construction and western washington ties you also know that a lot of these jobs tied to boeing are in king pierce and snohomish counties. You are from the east side of the state. What would you do to keep those jobs in western washington . Myef culp i lived most of life on the western side. Jay inslee is also from the eastern side. I love this entire state, north south, east, west. But the problem with in this state right now is the governor has lost touch with reality hes been working in government for decades. He has no clue whats going on in the real world. Hes never built a business from the ground up. I have. I started my business with one single employee and an old truck that i had bought from my grandpa on payments. I had a homemade single axle trailer thats how i started my Construction Business and i built that up over 20 years where i had multiple trucks and crews doing jobs all around puget sound. This governor has no clue what its like in the real world. This is not a business friendly state it has not been a business business friendly state for a long time and he has exacerbated that by his mandates extra regulations and higher taxes. This is a governor who promised eight years ago that he would not raise taxes and he has lied to us 33 times. The state budget has almost doubled under his tenure and when im governor this will be a business friendly state. Businesses like boeing will want to come here and stay here. Governor i want to give you a , chance at a rebuttal and also i i want to ask you about a comment that you made by publicly threatening boeing with taking a hard look at those tax breaks. Arent you playing with fire here . Gov. Inslee no. Were playing with common sense which is the citizens of this , state should be treated fairly and that means as boeings uh futures improve which they will we want them to be inspired and incentivized to come build planes here and this is one way to do it and if we give them an incentive they might think twice about leaving more jobs and thats a fair thing. This business thing is interesting. We had the the highest grade of you knowwe had the the highest grade of gdp growth a year or , two ago under my stewardship. Our state has been named the best place to do business by Business Insider and cnbc it has been named the best place to live and thats why people are moving here like crazy. People are coming from all over here if this is such a terrible business place why do these businesses keep coming here and growing this is a growth oriented state it is going to grow again when we defeat this epidemic. Governor i need to cut you , off on time there. Chief culp i want to give you a , chance at a rebuttal you know there arent a lot of large Global Aerospace firms that are in republican ferry county. What makes you think you are better equipped to deal with a company that size given your background . Chief culp well, the thing is this Current Governor thinks , hes a leader of everyone he thinks hes the leader of companies, he thinks hes the leader of our families he thinks hes a leader of our children and our businesses. Thats exactly the opposite thats true the governor is not the leader of the citizens lives or their businesses or their families. The governors job is to run the executive branch of the State Government and keep it within the confines of the constitution which is the rule of law he raised his right hand and swore an oath that i will uphold and defend the constitution of the state of washington and hes failing article 1 section 7 says that no citizen shall be disturbed in their private affairs i think weve been disturbed in our private affairs quite a bit by this governor. You said you not believe there is systemic racism. How then do you explain some of the big disparities for example the Median Income of white families in seattle is two and a half times that of black families and hispanic people are hospitalized with covid at four times the rate of white people in king county and what policies would you implement to close this gap . Chief culp the federal government and the State Government have laws uh in both constitutions that say that everyone will be treated equally regardless of their race their sex their gender or their orientation and i firmly believe that thats the way that it is and should be. There are sure there are racists among us and we need to root those people out when they commit crimes hate crimes is a felony in this state and it needs to be enforced. The biggest way that you uh bring in racial inequality is when you dont enforce the laws evenly. And we have a currently we have a governor who breaks the laws and commits misdemeanors and no one is held responsible. If you want to talk about racial inequality, lets talk about the Human Trafficking going on in this state and usually young women and young boys are victims of that. What is the governor doing about that . And then look at all the unsolved murders, embarq native American People . What is going on with that . That is real racial inequality. If the system is racist who has , been in charge of the system in Washington State for the last 35 years. The democrats. Thank you, mr. Culp. Governor inslee do you believe , in systemic racism and what concrete steps beyond appointing a task force or committees will , you implement to close the gaps between the races . Gov. Inslee the Racial Disparities is something i think all of us should want to do something about. They are profound. White families have 10 times as you knowwhite families have 10 times as much wealth as black , families. We have Racial Disparities in health care. We have Racial Disparities in education. It does not help that we have had a president who has fanned the flames of division in this regard. We have to act. We have to act in many ways. I hope that our action is not limited to looking at criminal justice issues. Yes, we are going to do things to assure independent evaluation and investigations and independent prosecutorial decisions. I am confident we will pass the legislation in january. But i think it is a window to do much more. Lets look at a way to get kids of color ready for kindergarten and ready for first grade, so they do not fall behind. Lets look for health care and by the way this world of donald , trump and chief culp means we will not have health care for many people of color. We have health care right now for 800,000 people now, because of obama care. You can be sure that will not be protected if my opponent became governor. These are concrete steps we are taking we just started an office and we just started an office of equity and i am confident we will make progress in january. Mr. Culp, an opportunity for a rebuttal and could you talk about policies you think governments should use to close these gaps beyond criminal justice . Economic gaps . Chief culp everyone should have equal opportunities in the United States. One of my best friends immigrated here from kenya at a young age. This is the land of opportunity. This was where he could live his dreams into anything he wanted to do. He immigrated here legally. Now he is the owner of a company has 800 or 900 employees. I want that opportunity for everyone. And so often, politicians pander to minorities when it is election time and they say how much they will do and then after the election, turn their back on them. That is why we have the same problems we have had for the last 20 years in our inner city. Governor, would you go beyond offering opportunity . Does more need to be done than just offering opportunity . Gov. Inslee yes. We need to stop republicans from taking away the things that do have a chance of ending disparity. I do have to express frustration on occasion with my republican colleagues who talk about equality, but every time we want to do something about it, they oppose it. Lets start with health care. It is one of the most important, precious things we have now. We do have disparities in health care. They want to take it away from 800,000 washingtonians. I cannot see how this makes us more equal. They have not helped us on a host of family leave issues. From family leave. I did overtime rules to protect working people myself. We have done a lot financially. Sowe have done a lot financially. , financial aid, Apprenticeship Programs. I started and Apprenticeship Program leading the nation. This is great to help people of color get new careers. Yet he wants to turn the out of office. Thank you both. Governor i want to ask you a , question on Police Reform and reforming Police Departments. Since the killing of george floyd by minneapolis police, we we have heard many discussions in terms of how Police Accountable for excessive use of force. You spoke about independent investigations. I want to ask you about two other sort of reforms. Do you want to see the end of qualified immunity that protects Abusive Police officers from civil lawsuits, and do you support rewriting police Union Contracts to allow cities to reform and restructure . Gov. Inslee im open to discussions with the community. And rather than run out and propose solutions to these things myself, i decided to listen to the citizens. So we have a task force, led i think listening is powerful now, to the people who have suffered this indignity and that violence. What we are doing. As you noted, i am confident we will pass the rule on independent investigation and independent prosecutorial. And we will listen to other ideas brought before us. One way or another we have to , bring more justice. We can do that. That is not inimical or inconsistent with good policing. I also believe we need to look at ways to provide help for folks with Mental Health problems. We have had disasters where police were called and people have been in Mental Health crises. I think we need to find a way to deal with Mental Health challenges, to prevent some of this violence. Again, i want to note this whole debate, i hope it comes from a broad scale societal conversation about how to get to racial equity. Chief culp, the same question. You have worked in Law Enforcement for a decade. I would like to hear your views on qualified immunity. Do you want to see the end of qualified immunity that protects officers from lawsuits and so protects Abusive Police officers from civil lawsuits. And do believe place Union Contract need to be rewritten, so cities can have different Police Reforms and restructure their departments . Chief culp i do not agree with the you far related that question. Qualified immunity does not protect abusive officers. Officers are prosecuted all the times for committing crimes. The governor talking about Mental Health in this state. Let me tell you a thing or two about the Mental Health problem in this state. I have dealt with it on the street level. I was a narcotics detective for three years. I dealt with people with addiction, with Mental Health crisis. The Mental Health system in this state is a joke. He has that eight years to do something about it but he lost certification to Western State hospital and with that went hundreds of beds and millions of dollars from the earl government for the Mental Health system in this state. So we can help people on the streets and in Mental Health crisis. When an officer, and this happens every day and night across the state. I have had this happen almost every time. When someone tries to take their life, they are obviously a Mental Health crisis. They are taken to the hospital by a Police Officer, and talk to the first level Mental Health counselor, and they call around the state to try to find a bed for them to get a higher level of care and nine times out of 10, there is not one and they are turned back out on the street. Thank you. Governor inslee . 45 second for a rebuttal to what the chief said and anything else you want to add about his statement. Gov. Inslee well, we are moving onto a major state of reforming the Mental Health system. We have improved it significantly. Our hospitals improve significant lay over the last few years. But it is an ancient facility. We to reform our system and that , is why we are starting this program, to have communitybased health closer to people. But if people do not have insurance, they cannot pay for this and the fundamental problem of chief culp when is his party he talks about this issue is his party and president want to take , away Health Insurance and Mental Health insurance for 800,000 people. And then whenever we talk about , actually paying for this, they want to cut the budget. His very Opening Statement was how he wants to cut the budgets. If youre going to cut budgets youre going to cut people in pain including Mental Health pain. Chief culp, i want to give your moment to respond to that i want to ask you a little bit about, youve said good Police Officers arrest the bad ones and put them in jail where they belong. But we do see Police Officers who are rehired after being fired for ms. Use of force. Can you address that . Chief culp yes can you tell me which circumstance which , officer . In seattle this happens with appeals to arbitration. An officer is fired, appeals to an arbitrator, and then they are reinstated. When atle, it happened man punched a handcuffed woman the face and broke her eye socket when she was handcuffed and then he was fired and reinstated when he appealed. How would you address anything like that dealing with arbitration . That sounds it was the Chiefs Department and youre telling me she is not for law and order, that she is racist in some way . I am not sure. I did not say that. Chief culp ok, so i dont know the details of that case. Any time an officer abuses their power, they should be held accountable. I am all for that. Ok, well. You for your responses. We will move onto the topic of civil unrest. A reminder to try to answer the questions asked of you. That is why we are here. Governor inslee, nearly two days after demonstrators took over an area outside of the Police Department in east precinct dubbing it an autonomous own you , claimed not to know about it, despite it being the subject of nonstop local and National News coverage, trending nationwide on twitter. What should voters make of the fact that you were apparently oblivious to police abandoning a precinct in the states largest city . Gov. Inslee yes, well, listen if you look at the facts, i , could not have been oblivious to it. Because i actually deployed the Washington StateNational Guard. Why do you say did not know about it . Gov. Inslee you will have to go back and look at some quote. I cannot comment on the quote right now. I cant tell you what we did was respond when cities, the ones responsible for their initial security. And we support those cities. And when they asked us to send the National Guard, we responded promptly and sent the National Guard i believe in the hundreds. , our Washington State patrol went and they were ready. I cleared the decision when it was made by the city to bring back Police Forces in the area. They were ready and they were staged, in fact, if they were needed. It was clear we did provide support as appropriate. This is a frustrating situation and i will tell you why. You had tens of thousands of people were peacefully protesting. Tens of thousands of people were marching. Without breaking windows. Without causing fires. And in their midst these folks , came in and caused violence. It was frustrating to those who believe this is a righteous cause do not want to see this violence. The violence is unacceptable to all of us and it should stop. I need to address that with you now. Your quote was, this is news to me, and went on to say, i have not heard about it for any credible source. You now say you did know. Gov. Inslee i knew about it. That is why we had state troopers ready to respond at the city request. If i made a misstatement, i made a misstatement. But clearly i did, we sent troops. This was something we did respond to seattles request. I will give you time to rebuttal. Chief culp on the topic of civil , unrest, we are talking about the nightly protests. Seattle dealt with by us over the summer. Washington leaders including the governor pushed back at the idea of federal intervention when it was suggested by the president. If elected governor under what , specific conditions would you support the presence of federal forces on local streets in response to civil unrest . Chief culp right, we currently have a governor who is very soft on crime and that is obvious. ,he does not know that crimes have been happening and that parts of seattle have been taken over and i saw him in the live conference. Clearly he had no clue what was going on or he was lying or one of the other. And yes, he did send in the National Guard. We all have the right to peacefully assemble and speak your mind. Right. But when it turns violent. When people start Looting Stores and light cars on fire, that is , no longer the First Amendment right. That is a crime called rioting. And although the governor did send in troops, the National Guard, because the governor is the commanderinchief of the Washington StateNational Guard, he sent them in but he disarmed them before he sent them in. I will never ever send our young men and women in uniform into a violent situation without the means to protect themselves and other people. That is what they are going in there for. And when people are committee crimes the National Guard will , assist local enforcement to arrest the criminals and put them in jail where they belong and the rest of the people involved will be told to disperse because it is a riot and if they do not, they will be arrested. That is how you deal with crime and shut down a riot. Chief, i will follow up with you on the question i asked about federal intervention in your rebuttal time. Governor inslee, in your rebuttal time was it your , quickly decision not to arm , the National Guard . I recall it as the mayors decision. Also, do support the federal prosecution of accused writers rioters . Gov. Inslee i do support prosecution of anyone involved in violent activity that is a crime. Isa prosecute drunk driving cases and spousal abuse cases. I do support that. Led bye were decisions democratically elected officials in the cities. Forces not only to seattle but to belleville bellevue in difficult times. The general, fantastic general he has helped me in many he has helped me in many emergencies. ,like oso he does a great job. And the bridge falling down. He does a great job. He told me we do not, and he did not want firearms. He did not believe that more firearms were the answer to magnify and give potential violence to the situation. Fortunately no one was hurt in the armed guard because i respect these people and they do fantastic work. So we want to continue to follow , the law. By the way, we are on the phone a lot. Me, do i have 45 seconds . Yes. Your 45 seconds ran out, if you want to finish off. Gov. Inslee it is curious to me that we have a Police Officer consciously violating the law, refusing to enforce a gun safety laws and then says the answer is , more guns on the street. We need people to follow the law. Chief culp, i want to give you 45 second rebuttal and why dont you respond to what the governor just said. Voter approved gun control there are measures, mandates, the courts have upheld that you refused to follow. Is it lawenforcement for everyone else but not for you . Chief culp Police Officers have discretion to enforce or not. Have you ever gotten pulled over and not gotten a ticket . Police officers have discretion. Chiefs of place and sheriffs have discretion on what they what they will focus on, with enforce, drug crimes, sex trafficking and speeding, that , is up to the discretion of chief Law Enforcement and the agency. For me to make the decision is based on the Washington State constitution, which you raised your right hand and took an oath to uphold and defend. Have you ever heard of article one, section 24 . The right to bear arms shall not be impaired . The right of the individual citizen to bear arms in defense of himself or the state shall , not be impaired . I am sure you can understand that. Maybe your grandkids could tell you if not. Gov. Inslee i will answer that question. We are out of time on the topic. Lets put it the budget. There was good news from the economic and Revenue Forecast Council which said last month the projected budget shortfall will not be as bad as first thought. But still significant, as well over 4 billion. I know you used the words pigeonholing earlier but those are bigger numbers than anything you had to deal with. In republic or ferry county. Your Police Station is smaller in factyour Police Station is smaller, than the tvw building that we are in now. So what is your plan and where do you cut . Chief culp yes. And career politician is a career politician is obviously doing a great job. What we have to do is so, freespending. As soon as i take office we are going to free spend it. We will not have any new programs, no pay raises, no new equipment. We will take a snapshot in time and find out where we are and then we will do programmatic cuts from the bottom up. And that is the way it has to be done. We will look at every program. It is going to be the hard work. I will not do with the Current Governor does acrosstheboard and suggest all the time cuts. ,that is the lazy politicians way of doing it. In the business world, if you do acrosstheboard cuts, you are cutting your salesforce your , fuel for crews to get to jobs. You are cutting our advertising budget. It is like cutting off your nose to spite your face. Acrosstheboard cuts are a politicians lazy way of doing things. We need to go line item by line item and do programmatic cuts. I would start with anything that has the word study in it. Politicians love to study things to death. They spend and waste millions of dollars on study after study after study, but it is a way for crony capitalism, a way for them to get money to their friends. Let me followup up with you, governor. There will be spending needs and shortfalls, despite that good news transportation , revenues are short 701 million coming up in the next budget cycle. You look at west seattle with a need for fixing the bridge there. It supports 100,000 people but the port of Seattle Washington , state ferry system, down the transit can the , state afford to put money in transportation projects given the revenue shortfalls now . Gov. Inslee well, to i will be talking legislators. I discussions yesterday with them to see about a potential transportation in the next budget. And we have had huge progress. We passed the most environmentally friendly budget perhaps in state history after republicans said no for three years. So i am willing to fight for transportation and we need a big Capital Budget so we can put people to work. But, obviously we need to look , at rational cuts. I actually have cut over half a billion dollars myself in my by executive action in the last two months. I have already made those cuts one half billion dollars. And those were painful at times. But they were necessary and i prepared us to get in a better position. And i have been vindicated in my decision about special session because we have got four and a half billion dollars extra revenue moving forward. But the plans i have seen from chief culp and the Republican Party essentially boils down to people in the middle of a pandemic. We should not take away health care from people who have cancer or covid right now the middle of a pandemic. We should not take away their Mental Health. We should not take away a womans right of choice and the ability to finance that. It is very much at risk right now. Governor, on time. I want to give chief culp a chance to rebut the governor. He just said he was vindicated in his decision to not call for a special session. Do you feel the same way . Do you feel there should be any state money put in a project like that west seattle bridge that engineers feel could collapse . Chief culp it is funny what he takes credit for. Everything that goes wrong if somebody elses fault. This is a governor, he has talking about not taking money away from taxpayers. Maybe we should talk about 164 thousand dollars per week that the governor paid a Global Consulting firm to tell him what to do and say on the covid crisis. And i did not misspeak. Week, is a,000 per nobid contract he signed with a Global Consulting firm. That is taxpayer money. How many businesses he put out of business without help . How any small mom and pop shops would it help . How much employment got sent overseas . Maybe that could be put there instead of a Global Consulting firm to tell him what to think and say. Governor i would like to give , you a chance to rebut the claims just made their bite to culp. Gov. Inslee i have no idea what he is referring to. But we have made good decisions dealing with covid lets talk about what is on the table. That is whether we will save lives. Whether we are going to have leadership to help people wear masks which chief culp has never , provided. Not only has he disagreed with my orders. But he has not been willing to show leadership modeling your , behavior. Going around rallies with no mask. Hobnobbing with trump ians trumpians. It is too dangerous mini trump to have a right now in the middle of this pandemic. That is what is at rest. I am in favor of saving lives and following the science. I am in favor of valuing everyones life and not diminishing them and in favor of doing things that are working. Our efforts against the pandemic are working. It is saving lives and we ought to keep doing it. Governor, chief, thank you. The next question is for you to begin with, mr. Culp. Lets talk about the fires that we have seen. In our state, these intensifiers. You have raised the question that the wildfires were coordinated. Do you have any direct evidence of that . And what role if any do think Climate Change plays . Chief culp i do not think i ever said these fires are coordinated. It is on your website. You raised the question that they were coordinated. It seems that it felt coordinated to you. I wonder if you any evidence of were responding to any evidence of that . Chief culp do i get my time back . Please go ahead. Chief culp ok. I talked to firefighters in the oaken noggin visiting families burned out. And the firefighter told me he was minutes behind the person who started the fire in the oaken noggin area. That is where that came from. I do not have any evidence. It is suspect that all of the fires at the same time with no started at the same time with no storms going on. But this governor calls these climate fires. That is nothing, i mean he has just deflecting. Like nothing is his fault and i said earlier nothing is his fault and everything is someone , elses fault. In this instance, he is blaming and these fires on the climate. I do not deny that Climate Changes. I remember in the it was all 1970s, over the news that there was global cooling. And then global warming, and now Climate Change. The Climate Changes. I do not dispute that. But these are not climate fires. These fires are the result of very poor management on a state level. We dont log our forest and replant them. We dont send the forest. We do not clean up the carbon on the forest floor. We have been shutting down road access, which limits firefighters to get back and fight these fires, as well as access for citizens to cut wood and go hunting and fishing. So we need to manage the forests and clean them up. That is why they burned so hot and so fast and kill people and , burn homes. Governor inslee we have more , than 2 million acres behind Forest Management that prevents on the kind of Forest Management that prevents wildfires from being so devastating. Why did we get so far behind during your eight years in office . And what are your plans to eliminate this backlog if you are elected to a third term . Gov. Inslee actually, i checked on this today. We have improved our management while i have been governor dramatically. Our investment has gone up by eight times. Up significantly. Acreage treated has goneup significantly. But there are 22 million acres of forest in our state. It takes a lot of money to do and that. You cannot send out a gardener with a rake like donald trump suggested. So, we are doing thinning. We are increasing thinning. It is a little frustrating because when i wrote a letter to donald trump asking him to do more thinning on federal forests, he actually slashed the budgets for it. So there are a lot of lies coming out of the white house. I think it is distressing. Lets talk about the real issue here which is Climate Change. , for people to run for governor of the state of washington at this date, with the damage Climate Change is doing to our state, not just fires, but killing salmon because the water is too hot, and too acidic. In changing the hydrological cycles so farmers do not have irrigation, and changing the growing season we have. To have someone run in washington following donald trump over the cliff into the abyss of Climate Change, that i believe is unacceptable in our state. We deserve better. We need someone who will not just signs but will act on it. We have a plan to do that and i hope you will ask about it. It is an important issue. Mr. Culp, could you respond and tell us whether you have any policies you would implement to make a difference in Climate Change . Chief culp yes, i love clean water, clean air, clean land. No one cares about our climate, about our environment, than people who are actually handson. The farmers, the renters, the loggers hunters and fishermen. ,the hunters and fishermen. I have been a hunter and fisherman my entire life. I have spent days and hours, whole life, out in the woods and on the water. My grandpa was a commercial fisherman. My other grandpa my dads side was a sport fisherman. I grew up on the water and i grew up hunting. No one cares about the land in the water more than the people who have hands on. We need to get bureaucrats out of the way. The reason we do not have salmon is because this governor has failed to take care of that. We need hatcheries putting out on hundred percent. Governor inslee as you , respond, would you talk about whether anything you want to do with Climate Change would make much of a difference in the short term . Where we are already seeing these fires . Gov. Inslee yes. What is when you do something to makes a difference in life save , yourself and the health of your children. This is a health issue. I think we should fight for health causing respiratory distress. Our children should not have to breathe the smoke every day in the summer which will happen if we do not act on Climate Change. I do not know which is worse. Denying that Climate Change is caused by carbon, or admitting it and refusing to do anything about it. Chief culp has proposed zero things to do with Climate Change. We can talk about how we are going to grow jobs and solar, like we are doing in bellingham, with cross laminated timber like we are doing in spokane. The solar panel, solar farm in southeast washington, this is we are growing jobs all of the state. This is the perfect Economic Growth opportunity for us and i am confident we can exploit those if we had a governor who understands Climate Change and job creation. Thank you. Let me end it here. I want to talk about your record as governor. During your two terms in office there have been several highprofile instances of mismanagement at state agencies under your watch. This includes as chief culp mentioned the decertification of Western State hospital and the loss of 50 millidollars per year in federal funds. It includes more recently what fraud mass unemployment have seen undetected in the start of the coronavirus crisis, costing the state hundreds of millions of dollars. Given these kinds of why should why should lapses voters have , faith in your ability to competently manage the state for the next four years . Gov. Inslee because i care about them and want to do everything humanly possible to help them. The frustrations of Unemployment Compensation difficulties are profound and sincere and i feel them as much or more as people who are suffering them. Not more. But look what happened here. Natural disasters can destroy buildings. Agencysdestroy an capability to respond in a timely fashion. That is fundamentally what happened here. The number of claims went up by a factor of 10 overnight. That is like seven her thousand people showing up at huskies stadium that seats 70,000. These lines develop we have been moving heaven and earth to get peoples checks to them, who are entitled. It takes time to figure out who is entitled. 1300 people we brought in the , National Guard. They have done a great job. We have new technology. In the midst of that, these criminals of a sophisticated International Ring attacked us like they attacked other states and made off with 2 . But im pleased that 98 of those dollars went to deserving washingtonians. But im happy we reduced the people waiting from hundreds of thousands to a few thousand and we are determined to everything humanly possible to get those folks the dollars. They need at. We expanded Workers Compensation and on appointment. We want to help them. We have had moratoriums on evictions. Thank you chief culp, i want to ask you about your background in management. You manage a Police Department of one person yourself. At its peak, i believe they had two officers including you. Since you are a police chief in a town of 1100 people, what makes you qualified to lead a state with 7. 6 million residents with more than 68,000 state employees . Chief culp i appreciate the question. As i said earlier i am not , running to be the leader of everyones family or of your business. I am not running to be the leader of you. You, the citizens, will be the leaders of yourself. Your family, and your business. I will be the governor who understands the servant role of the governor. And i will run the executive branch of the State Government and you will run your business and your life. That is the way a Public Servant should act. And this governor wants to tie me to things that he thinks President Trump has done wrong. And what did he call us . People come to my rallies, trumpians . These are thousands of washington citizens who come to my rallies. These are people that care about their state from state. All over this state. From king county to spokane county, from ferry county down to klickitat county. These are washington citizens and i am hearing from them by the thousands every day. They do not like it is going on in this state. They want a servant government back. One that will stay within the confines of the constitution and rule of law. I will ask you each a quick question. We do not have much time. Chief culp, you often talk about how we have a Mental Health and a drug problem and not a homelessness problem. But you also say you will not raise the state budget you will not increase spending to possibly address the problems. How would you invest in Mental Health and drug treatments if you are promising to cut the state budget. Chief culp i never said we do not have a housing problem but it is not all about homes. This is about a health and addiction problem. We are already spending and wasting millions of dollars across the state on Mental Health and drug addiction programs that are not working. I know of one, i toured one down in longview not too long ago that went from singledigit success rate to 76 success rate by taking less state funding and making their own rules. We did not have 45 seconds on this one. Chief culp 15 seconds . Ok. Hear from like to your campaign without longview program is. To ask you want quickly you had promised in , previous campaigns, you said taxes were not the right direction for our state ran in when you ran in 2012. Do you anticipate an increase in necessary . Taxes will be necessary . Gov. Inslee you cannot make the decision now. You have to look at the economic circumstances we have in i will december. Propose a balanced budget and i will protect health care. I will protect the most needy and women who have choice right now that republicans want to take away. By the way, i will also protect those from gun violence. And gun safety we have not talked about tonight. But i have her chief culp talk about law and order. He is a law and order person. I am sure he believes he is. I do not understand why he refuses to enforce the constitutional law that protects us from gun violence. We have to stop. We are out of time for questions. We have to move on to closing statements. Mr. Call chief culp you just , have one minute for a closing statement. Chief culp thank you very much and to cover with the governor just talked about, gun violence. Just like i said he wants to , focus the blame on something other than what it is. We do not have a gun violence problem. In the state or in this country. We have a criminal violence problem. We need to focus on the criminals. And put them in jail. And in prison where they belong. We need a governor who will quit releasing prisoners, convicted and violent felons, and putting them back on the streets in our communities where they reoffend. Almost 1000 of them because you know, he releasedalmost 1000 of them because the state courts told him he has to come up with a plan to keep prisoners say from cobit and the prison system. And instead of coming up with a plan and keeping these violent felons in the state prisons, he said open the gate and let them out. And you add that to the 3000 or 4000 released not long ago because of that they said it was , a glitch in the department of corrections software that the governor knew about and did not fix. Two murders have happened because of that and people are back in our jails and our prisons. Because this governor is soft on crime and does not care about safety. Ens gov. Inslee by the way i have , nothing against republic. My grandmother was born there in but i am against going backwards 1904. In our effort to build this state. We have shown profound progress in education. Some of the best education in the states history. Profound progress in health care. We have demonstrated the ability to build a great economy and we can still do that. I am confident we can return to those days but we first have to lock down this virus. We know that the key to opening up the economy is to reduce the number of people affected by the virus. Leadership. To do that, we have to heavily we cannot ignore this. We have to have a governor who will help people understand the Science Behind masks and will understand the help, as we are to help businesses recover doing , now. , i am excited about the prospects of leading this state. I am confident. I believe that bold and decisive leadership works. It has