Ted Lina is the AP Government teacher at St. Joe's and will be moderating the event, supplied with questions provided by students as well as members of the Equity and Justice Club.
Political debates are often thought about strictly in terms of Democrats versus Republicans, but this race pits two candidates who were vying for the Democratic Party line during the June primary.
"When you have a one-party town like Buffalo, what happens, which I don't think is that unusual, you end up having differences within the party because parties are not monolithic," said Lina. "When you think about it, we have only two major parties for a country of well over 300 million people, and in many European countries, they have eight, nine...and more political parties."
But how much could a debate so close to Election Day actually impact or sway the way people vote?
UB Political Science Professor Jacob Neiheisel said it's those differences Lina discussed that could make this a more influential debate than a typical Republican vs. Democrat back and forth.
"When you have a strong party queue in the race, it's a lot of inertia to overcome - people don't readily cross party lines - certainly it happens every election cycle, but the vast majority of partisans vote for their co-partisan candidates," said Neiheisel. "When it comes to some kind of internal squabble, whether it be a primary, or in this case, a general election between two Democrats, the information that a debate provides is a lot more efficacious."
Neiheisel did however say it's bizarre timing for a debate due to the proximity of the election. Also, thousands of people have already cast their vote in the early voting period.
"There's some evidence that debates matter at the margins when it comes to convincing voters not just to support one side over another, but convincing them to turn out in general," he added.
According to Lina, debates may not necessarily change a voter's mind on who to vote for, but rather if they vote at all.
"It tends to be that if a mistake is made and they lose votes," said Lina. "I don't think that it plays a major impact in terms of getting new voters, but I definitely think it could hurt a candidate."
The debate can be heard LIVE on News Radio 930 WBEN.
