The first debate occurred on October 2 at WKAR-TV in East Lansing. Both candidates spent the hour trading charges and countercharges. "Detroit News" pollster Ed Sarpolus indicated that there was no clear winner in the debate, but Bill Rustem, senior vice president of the nonpartisan policy firm Public Sector Consultants in Lansing, favored Granholm. The consensus of pundits Bill Ballenger, George Bullard, Kathy Barks Hoffman and Rick Albin and capital correspondent Tim Skubick, speaking on the October 6 WKAR-television program Off the Record, was that both DeVos and Granholm emerged losers, losing 2 and 4 percentage points' support after the event. No major gaffes or zingers came out in the debate. Some of the positions were made clear on embryonic stem cell research and abortion. No major gaffes came out in the debate, but one minor zinger was made by Granholm about DeVos' investment in Alterra, a chain of nursing homes which sexually abused and neglected its patients.