WASHINGTON — Republican presidential candidate John McCain will attend tonight's scheduled debate in Oxford, Miss.

McCain had suspended his campaign and said he might not participate if there were no resolution to the fight over the Treasury Department's plan to set up a fund to purchase illiquid assets.

But his spokesman Brian Rogers said there has been sufficient progress and that McCain has been assured that all parties will be represented during subsequent negotiations. Rogers also said McCain would return to Washington, D.C. after the debate “to ensure that all voices and interests are represented in the final agreement, especially those of taxpayers and homeowners.”

McCain had originally requested that the debate, which is scheduled to start at 9:00 p.m. EDT and will be moderated by Jim Lehrer, be postponed until after the negotiations have been completed. But both Democratic candidate Barack Obama and the commission sponsoring the debates rejected that idea.