The former President Trump and the Democratic nominee Kamala Harris have agreed to a debate on September 10. The event will be moderated by ABC, which announced the news Thursday. The date had previously been set by Trump and President Biden before Biden bailed on the race in late July.
The agreement comes after a week in which Trump pushed heavily to solidify his preferred date of September 4 with Fox News as moderators. The former president even questioned whether the two adversaries actually needed to debate during a recent interview with the Fox News Business Network host Maria Bartiromo.
“I mean right now I say, why should I do a debate?” Trump said only a week ago. “I’m leading in the polls. And, everybody knows her, everybody knows me.”
That talk appears now to have been just that—talk. The ABC announcement came during Trump’s snap press conference at Mar-a-Lago on Thursday.
“I think it’s very important to have debates,” Trump said during the presser, contradicting his position from only days previous. “I look forward to the debates because I think we have to set the record straight.”
Trump hit his trademark points throughout a combative Q&A session that followed short remarks in which the former president warned America was on the precipice of another world war.
Trump complained about media coverage of his campaign rally sizes, he criticized Governor Brian Kemp (R-GA) for the state voting Biden in 2020, and suggested the nation is on the brink of another Great Depression. He also attacked Harris vociferously.
“She doesn’t know how to do a news conference,” Trump retorted when asked about Harris’s failure to meet with the press. “She’s not smart enough to do a news conference.”
Later, Trump called a female reporter’s question “stupid” when she asked why Trump hasn’t held a public campaign event in nearly a week. When one reporter asked whether the Trump campaign will need to reformulate their strategy to win black voters due to Harris’ ascension, Trump said he was “way up” with white males. The former president also expressed an openness to legalizing marijuana as states across the nation decriminalize the recreational drug.
Although the Harris campaign has not agreed to two other debate dates, Trump announced Thursday his plans to debate Harris on September 4 on Fox News and September 25 on NBC.
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