Nevada Democrats Drop Debate

The Nevada Democratic Party canceled yesterday an August debate in Reno it had been scheduled to co-sponsor with Fox News, after weeks of complaints from liberal groups and a controversial remark by the network's chairman.

Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes said Thursday while accepting an award from the Radio and Television News Directors Foundation: "It is true that Barack Obama is on the move. I don't know if it's true that President Bush called Musharraf and said, 'Why can't we catch this guy?' "

Democrats said the comment, which referred to Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, likened Obama, a senator from Illinois, to Osama bin Laden.

Last night, Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) and Tom Collins, chairman of the Nevada Democratic Party, released a letter to the network that said Ailes "went too far." "We cannot, as good Democrats, put our party in a position to defend such comments," the two added.

Long before Ailes's remark, Fox News's sponsorship of the Reno debate among presidential contenders had become a major controversy. The liberal activist group MoveOn.org had been circulating a petition that called on party officials to drop Fox News, calling it a "mouthpiece" for Republicans. Former senator John Edwards (N.C.), a 2008 Democratic presidential candidate, had said he would not participate in the debate.

In a statement, David Rhodes, a vice president of Fox News, said: "News organizations will want to think twice before getting involved in the Nevada Democratic Caucus, which appears to be controlled by radical fringe out-of-state interest groups, not the Nevada Democratic Party."