CONWAY — Jeb Bradley, whose  dismal showing in a 2006 debate in Conway helped open the door for Democrat Carol Shea-Porter’s upset victory, turned down a rematch with Rep. Shea-Porter Sunday at Conway Elementary School.
 

First District Congresswoman Shea- Porter is still planning to attend and will instead host a town hall forum with voters beginning at 5 p.m. at Conway El.

“At the moment it doesn’t look like we can fi t it in our schedule,” said Periklis Karoutas, a Bradley spokesman.

The debate was being orchestrated by the Conway Education Associa- tion, which had sponsored events between First District congressional candidates twice before. Association 

president Curtis Finney said he was disappointed that Bradley couldn’t make it and more disappointed at the reasons.

“They cited Jeb’s busy schedule and also that there are three debates scheduled already (elsewhere in the state), and that it was too tight to schedule fourth debate in the North 

Country,” Finney said.

Finney said a Bradley spokesman also told him it was too long of a drive to Conway to debate. “The line that they used ... was that it’s a long drive up north,” Finney recalled.

Karoutas said the remark about the long drive was taken out of con- text. “What I said was that we had two other prior commitments on the Seacoast, which would have made it 

impossible to make it there on time for the debate.”

He said Bradley’s campaign sched- ule is often completely full long in advance and even more so in the waning days before the Nov. 4 elec- tion. He said squeezing in new events 

at the last minute is extremely difficult.

In a release, the Shea-Porter cam- paign accused Bradley of ignoring the North Country.

“New Hampshire’s First District is much larger than Manches- ter and the Seacoast,” said Pia Carusone, Shea-Porter’s campaign manager. “It’s a shame that Mr. Bradley doesn’t 

value this part of the district.”

Barring any major changes, Sunday’s town hall event at Conway Elementary School, on Main Street in Conway Village, will begin at 5 p.m. Doors will open at 4 p.m. Bradley has participated in debates in Conway during two previous elections that were sponsored by the Conway Education Association, including one in 2006 that is credited with giving Shea- Porter momentum. In that event, Bradley famously declined to answer an offbeat question about whether he believed Pluto was a planet or not, instead preferring to leave it to experts to decide.

BY CASEY CONLEY