A consortium of politically progressive organizations are first out of the gate for the East Gate Metro to present a gubernatorial candidate forum November 2, 7-9 pm at Stillwater Middle School. Sponsoring groups are Indivisible Marine on St Croix, the St Croix Valley Women’s Alliance, Indivisible Afton, Young Democrats of Stillwater and DFL Senate District 39.

All six candidates were invited: Tim Walz, Paul Thissen, Rebecca Otto, Chris Coleman, Erin Murphy and Tina Liebling.

Moderating the event will be Pam Neary. Neary was a DFL MN House member from 1992-94, a campaign manager for two governors’ campaigns and has been an advisor to local and women candidates for twenty years. Neary will lead the discussion starting with an overview of the caucus and convention process and how it relates to the candidates on stage. Because there has been a significant spike in civic engagement, particularly after the Women’s March, the forum will briefly explain how people can get involved at the local and statewide levels.

Event chair Wendy Ward felt it was important to offer this forum early for two reasons, “We really want to ride the coattails of people getting engaged and involved in politics, whether it be emailing, tweeting, visiting their representatives, going after local level seats or even candidate consideration. Secondly, we wanted to present these candidates before the caucusing–convention process is in full swing so that engagement in that critical process is possible. Our goal for the evening is to fire up and inform the audience.”

The event is free, open to the public and will be held at Stillwater Middle School, 523 Marsh St W, Stillwater, MN 55082, November 2, 7-9 pm. Doors open at 6:30 pm

Indivisible groups are local, grassroots and progressive chapters working to create change. There are some 75 Indivisible chapters in Minnesota. DFL SD39 represents Washington County. Young Democrats of Stillwater are students at Stillwater High school.