CHARLOTTESVILLE (CVILLE RIGHT NOW) — Virginia’s major Attorney General candidates have agreed to a debate next week, less than a month from Election Day. Republican and incumbent Jason Miyares will face Democratic nominee Jay Jones next Thursday, Oct. 16 at 6 p.m. at the University of Richmond.

The school is hosting the debate alongside the Virginia State Bar. In-person tickets are sold out but the event will be livestreamed on the University of Richmond School of Law’s website.

The debate will mark the first time Miyares and Jones have shared a stage during the election cycle. It comes in the midst of Jones’ recent scandal, in which violent text messages the candidate sent to a House of Delegates colleague in 2022 were discovered. In those messages, Jones suggested he’d like to see House Speaker Todd Gilbert and his family become the victims of gun violence, prompting President Donald Trump, Republican nominee for governor Winsome Earle-Sears and other prominent GOP leaders to call for him to drop out of the race.

Since then, Jones has released a statement accepting responsibility for the messages, and Miyares has released a digital ad calling out his opponent for the scandal.

The latest poll from Christopher Newport University’s Wason Center, which released on Monday but was taken before the text message scandal, showed Jones with 6-point lead over Miyares 49%-43%.