UPDATE: The McCain-Obama debate is on!

WASHINGTON (AP) - Republican John McCain will attend tonight's presidential debate, his campaign said Friday, even though Congress doesn't yet have a bailout deal in place.

Less than 10 hours before the debate was scheduled to start, the McCain campaign announced that the Arizona senator would travel to Mississippi to face off against Barack Obama. The campaign said he will fly back to Washington after the forum to continue working on the financial crisis.

"He is optimistic that there has been significant progress toward a bipartisan agreement," the campaign's statement said. Earlier in the week, McCain said he would delay the debate "until we have taken action to address this crisis."

The debate will air at 9 p.m. on most major networks including WFMJ-TV, the local NBC affiliate.