Michigan State University Debate will compete with three student teams at the upcoming National Debate Tournament – a status only given to a select group of colleges in the country. It’s the first time since 2014 that MSU has qualified three teams for the national competition, once again proving it remains an elite debate program.
The other colleges qualifying three teams are: Emory University, Harvard University, Northwestern University, University of Georgia and the University of Kansas – adding to the total 78 teams that will compete at the national tournament, running Friday to Monday at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis.
Representing MSU will be: social relations and policy sophomore Alex Brown and his teammate, zoology and public policy sophomore Lauren Pepper; biosystems engineering sophomore Evan Jones and his teammate, political theory and constitutional democracy sophomore Jack Scullion; and international relations sophomore Ezra Serrins and his teammate, political theory and constitutional democracy junior Lena Grossman.
“This marks the 23rd consecutive year that Michigan State University has competed at the National Debate Tournament,” said Head Coach Will Repko. “We look forward to seeing the students debate to the best of their abilities in Minneapolis.”
This season’s debate topic has been, “Resolved: The United States federal government should substantially increase statutory and/or judicial restrictions on the executive power of the president of the United States in one or more of the following areas:
- authority to conduct first-use nuclear strikes;
- congressionally delegated trade power;
- exit from congressional-executive agreements and Article II treaties;
- judicial deference to all or nearly all federal administrative agency interpretations of statutes and/or regulations;
- the bulk incidental collection of all or nearly all foreign intelligence information on United States persons without a warrant.”
The MSU debate team is a unit within the Honors College.
