After a long wrangling, US presidential candidate Donald Trump has confirmed his participation in the televised debate with his rival Kamala Harris scheduled for September 10. He has reached an “agreement” with Harris about the debate, Trump announced on Tuesday (local time). According to him, the same rules will apply as in the duel that Trump had with President Joe Biden at the end of June.
The debate between Trump and Harris on September 10th on ABC News had actually been agreed upon about three weeks ago. However, Trump subsequently questioned his participation, accusing ABC News of being biased against him. Trump’s back and forth about the debate sparked ridicule from the Harris team, which released a campaign video with chickens clucking. “Chicken” is a term for a coward.
Trump has now repeated his accusations against ABC News. In his online network Truth Social, he called the news channel “by far the meanest and most unfair” in the industry. The Republican justified his desire to debate on ABC News by saying that the channel had assured him that the debate in Philadelphia would be “fair and just.”
“The rules will be the same as in the last CNN debate,” the former president explained, referring to his duel with Biden on June 27. At that time, the duelists were not allowed to take notes to their lecterns. The microphone of the participant whose turn it was was also muted to prevent interruptions.
However, the Harris team did not comment on Tuesday on whether it accepted the rules for the debate on September 10. The Democrat’s team would prefer the microphones to remain on at all times. The calculation behind this is apparently that Trump could put himself in a bad light by interrupting his opponent with rude remarks.
According to the Harris team, Trump originally agreed that the microphones would remain on the entire time. But Trump apparently “let his aides overrule him” on this issue.
The September 10th duel is the only one so far agreed between Harris and Trump before the November 5th election. Trump called for another debate on September 4th on the right-wing channel Fox News. Harris, however, rejected this date. Nevertheless, he is keeping the date open in case she “changes her mind.”
CNN, for its part, announced that it would conduct an interview with Harris and her vice presidential candidate Tim Walz this Thursday. It is the vice president’s first interview since President Biden withdrew from the candidacy and she was named presidential candidate. Trump had repeatedly accused his opponent of avoiding an interview.
The 81-year-old Biden had decided not to run for president again in light of the debate within his own party about his mental state. The debate was sparked by his erratic performance in the TV debate with Trump. After that, the Democrats quickly united behind Harris, and she formally accepted her nomination last Thursday at the party convention in Chicago.
In most polls, Harris has narrowly placed herself ahead of Trump. This week, more than 230 former staffers of Republican presidents and presidential candidates also endorsed her candidacy in an open letter.
Despite numerous “ideological differences of opinion” with Harris and Walz, the 238 signatories announced that they would vote for both in the November election. The alternative was “simply unbearable,” they declared, referring to Trump. According to US media, the signatories had previously worked for Presidents George Bush Sr. and George W. Bush, as well as Senators and presidential candidates John McCain and Mitt Romney.
