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Rob McKenna AWOL on Science and Technology in Washington State Race

Gubernatorial candidate declines to answer a subset of six of the Top American Science Questions

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Shawn Otto, CEO, ScienceDebate.org

Seattle — October 19, 2012. From Amazon to Boeing to Microsoft, much of Washington State's economy is driven by advanced science and technology, so ScienceDebate.org teamed up with the Northwest Science Writers Association and several other Washington State science organizations to ask the candidates for governor how they would prioritize science and technology in their administration.  The six questions were a subset of fourteen recently answered by President Obama and Governor Romney.

Jay Inslee, the democratic candidate, provided timely and interesting responses, but Rob McKenna, the republican candidate, ignored numerous invitations to participate, leaving voters with no sense of how—or if— McKenna would prioritize science and technology in his administration. 

"This is the twenty-first century. Science and technology now impact every aspect of life," said Shawn Otto, CEO of ScienceDebate.org, which is also cosponsored by the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, the Council on Competitiveness, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.  "They are responsible for more than half of our economic development and lie at the center of our thorniest public policy challenges.  In this day and age, and especially in a state with an economy as driven by science as Washington's, serious candidates for governor should be willing to tell voters where they stand on these issues that affect all voters' lives."

Inslee's answers to the questions detail his positions on issues ranging from climate change to the role science will play in public policymaking in an Inslee administration.

In addition to the above organizations, the Washington State ScienceDebate initiative was supported by Town Hall Seattle, the Pacific Science Center, and Science Online Seattle.

The candidates' responses can be viewed at http://www.sciencedebate.org/wa2012/

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