The first debate in the Jason Plummer-Bill Enyart congressional race is just a little more than five weeks away — 7 p.m. Aug. 15 in Carbondale.

The news came the same day that Enyart released 10 years of tax returns. Now the pressure is really on for Plummer to do the same.

Here’s some free campaign advice for Plummer: Release the tax returns now, long before the debates. If there’s politically damaging information in the returns, better to take the hit early. Failure to do so hands your opponent ammunition and makes people wonder what you’re hiding. In a close race, you don’t want to risk this being the deciding factor.

h/t: BND.com