Presidential Candidates Headline Forum At North Texas Megachurch
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NORTH TEXAS (CBSDFW.COM) - The list of 2016 presidential hopefuls who are headed to North Texas for a candidate's forum continues to grow.
All of the major Democratic and Republican candidates have been invited to the North Texas Presidential Forum at Prestonwood Baptist Church in Plano, and so far half a dozens candidates have signed on.
Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush will join Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, Texas Senator Ted Cruz, retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee and former Senator Rick Santorum onstage.
The church teamed up with the Faith & Freedom Coalition to host the forum, that will be moderated by Prestonwood Pastor Jack Graham, who said, "I'm gonna have the privilege of interviewing each one, talking to them about the things that we care about. Issues that are important to us, which really includes a wide variety of things and not the things you would think would be just typical."
Pastor Graham stressed hat the event is an assembly and not a fundraiser or debate. "We're doing this because we obviously care about the country. We just had this idea that, what if we could bring in the presidential candidates and have a conversation with each one of them, not in a debate forum but rather in a conversation?"
While the event was open to everyone it is sold out. Graham explained, "It's amazing. We put it on social media, I just put out a Twitter [sic] and 36 hours later we're sold out."
There has been no word from Democratic Party candidates former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders. So far, only the six Republican candidates have confirmed they'll be attending -- and none of those six include front-runner and real estate tycoon Donald Trump. Graham said they are in talks with Trump. "You we'll miss him if he's not there. We hope he comes [and] Marco Rubio same thing."
The North Texas Presidential Forum will take place at 3 p.m. on October 18. Prestonwood Baptist Church is located at 6801 W. Park Boulevard, Plano, Texas 75093. If you're among those who wanted to attend but didn't get a ticket, the event will be broadcast on C-SPAN.
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