TULSA, Okla — TULSA, Okla. — To help voters understand the election process and who they’re voting for, the University of Tulsa partnered with several other organizations to host another candidate forum.
The last one was held August 11:
Local News
Drummond at Tulsa GOP runoff forum: I consider some extreme Republicans fascist
The university opened up its Lorton Performance center for the free event, allowing guests to come in and speak with candidates about what issues they find important.
Organizer and Director of Civic Engagement, Melissa Abdo, said she is excited for people to come out, learn more and get involved with the election.
“It's really important for for our voters to show up," Abdo said. "Oklahoma unfortunately ranks near the bottom of voter participation, and so I think for people to decide what's important to them and come listen to the candidates who are running to represent them.”
Abdo says she was also very proud of students Lillie Grace Saylor and Beckham Schell, who helped organize the event.
“We also helped work on a voter guide, so that's kind of what all of this is a part of," said Schell. "It's part of the Tulsa undergraduate research challenge, and so we were fellow research students for this project. So it was really nice to dive in deep.”
Saylor echoed the sentiment, saying it's important to her to eliminate a lot of misinformation, and hearing straight from candidates.
“What they really think instead of anything being misconstrued or take it a different way," Saylor said. "I feel like at the end of the day, it's like you see that it's not so extremist, and everyone really is just a person, and we just disagree on things.”
While State Attorney General Republican Candidate Jon Echols didn’t attend the forum, Democratic Candidate Nick Coffey did.
Coffey said holding those in government accountable is one of the biggest values he’s running on.
"It sure appeared to me that state officials, when they violated the law in Oklahoma, they were getting special treatment," Coffey said. "My goal, and this is again why I think it's so important to have a prosecutor. Prosecutors hold people accountable."
Democratic Gubernatorial Candidate Cyndi Munson was also present, saying she is trying to bring about unity while prioritizing issues like increasing wages, healthcare, childcare and education.
She hopes she can also roll out a "clean bill" for an increase in minimum wage that everyone can agree on.
"There are too many Oklahomans who are not making enough money to make basic ends meet," Munson said. "I just recently met with the Tulsa area United Way. If you're familiar with the Alice report, it's been updated on working families across Oklahoma and what it takes to pay for a one-bedroom apartment to just take care of your basic necessities."
Republican Gubernatorial Candidate Mike Mazzei was a no-show like last forum, so 2 News reached out to see if he had a statement. His team sent this:
Election Day will be November 3. 2 News will have the latest coverage.
Facebook 
TikTok 
YouTube
Instagram
Threads
X