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SALT LAKE CITY -- With Election Day less than a month away, Republicans are hoping to take over Congress from majority Democrats.
In the race for Utah's 1st Congressional District seat, it's an underdog Democrat who wants to turn the tables and unseat four-term incumbent Rob Bishop in a rematch.
When voters in Northern Utah go to the polls, they'll face a distinct choice. Rob Bishop is a long-time GOP incumbent
"If one is satisfied with what's happened in Washington for the last two years, with Nancy Pelosi, I'm probably not your candidate. But I'm not satisfied," Bishop says.
His Democratic challenger is a former agricultural consultant who is now a seminary teacher for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
"I believe we need to restore power back to the people of this country, and we need to really clean house," Morgan Bowen says. "Let's clean house and send some new people to Washington D.C."
The two candidates debated on a recent taping of Sunday Edition with Bruce Lindsay, which is scheduled to run Oct. 9. One of the many topics they discussed was the Tea Party movement.
"I think Congressman Bishop has got to have a little bit of fear in him based on that movement," Bowen says. "So obviously running to the Tea Party is a very politically expedient thing to do."
"I like how they're talking about the fact that cutting the spending in Washington is so essential," Bishop says. "It's those deficits that are driving down the inability of the markets to recover."
The two also have different prescriptions about how to cure what ails the United States. Bowen backs a 1 percent fee on hedge fund derivatives -- a major culprit of the economic meltdown, he says.
"A simple solution would be a 1 percent fee on all speculative trades like that," he says. "If you put a 1 percent fee on that, then the conservative estimates are saying that are you're going to raise $500 billion a year."
Bishop makes the case for states' rights and handing more power back to the private sector.
"By reinvigorating local government and people to be able to solve their own particular problems," the congressman says. "The solution is to come back with an accurate approach to try and reinvigorate the private sector."
Bowen faces an uphill climb. Bishop won each of his prior races for the seat handily.
You can see the entire debate between Bowen and Bishop coming up on Sunday Edition, this Sunday at 9 a.m.
E-mail: jdaley@ksl.com
