Heck campaign: ‘Titus chose to cheat in the debate after talking about cheating’

By Delen Goldberg

Friday, Oct. 15, 2010 | 3:43 p.m.

Updated at 5:30 p.m.

The UNLV College Republicans sent a letter this afternoon to the UNLV president and Board of Regents asking them to respond to Titus' actions and "to admonish such behavior to protect the integrity of the university."

"This is like using your lecture notes during a closed book test," UNLV College Republican Senior Vice President Jay Yoon said. "For a professor who has spent a lifetime enforcing academic rules, Dina Titus has failed to play fair."

Posted at 3:43 p.m.

Campaign officials for Republican Congressional candidate Joe Heck are accusing Democratic Rep. Dina Titus of cheating during Thursday night's televised debate.

The campaigns had agreed to a specific format before the debate: Titus and Heck would ask each other questions. Each would be allowed one note card on which to write the questions. The note card would only be used while asking questions.

The rules for the U.S. Senate debate differed. PBS officials confirmed the rules for the Titus-Heck debate.

"My understanding is that they were to have no notes," said Tom Axtell, the station's general manager.

Heck brought a note card and read from it as agreed upon. Titus brought a three-ring binder and appeared to refer to it during her closing statement. She flipped through the pages at least twice during her remarks.

“Nevadans deserve better from their elected officials," Heck campaign manager Grant Hewitt said. "They deserve elected officials who follow the rules, are honest and stand up with integrity. Congresswoman Titus last night chose to cheat in the debate after talking about cheating."

Titus, a UNLV professor, said during the debate that she does not tolerate cheating in her classes. She was responding to a question Heck asked about misleading ads aired on her behalf.

Titus spokesman Andrew Stoddard dismissed the accusations.

"Joe Heck was complaining that we were not talking about the issues and here he is trying to distract from what we thought was a spirited discussion of the issues," Stoddard said.

Stoddard said Titus' notebook contained questions only. He said she referred to it during the closing statements because there were questions the candidates didn't get to that she wanted to address.

Stoddard said he didn't recall any conversation about candidates' using notes only while asking questions.