Former President Donald Trump walked away victorious in his first presidential debate in June against President Joe Biden — but his campaign doesn't expect it will be so easy in next week's debate with Vice President Kamala Harris.
According to Axios, Trump campaign manager Chris LaCivita told House Republicans "they're anticipating a 'fine' performance from VP Harris during Tuesday's debate" — but, on the other hand, LaCivita "noted that Harris has less recent live interview or debate experience than Trump," which would be a point of hope for them.
In the same session, Republicans expressed more optimism about their chances of winning a Senate majority, where the map is skewed dramatically in their favor due to the specific seats up for election, and of defending their House majority despite a cash disadvantage against Democrats.
The first presidential debate, hosted in Atlanta by CNN, was widely considered to be a disaster for Biden, as his faltering performance and low energy convinced a critical mass of Democratic voters and leadership that he wasn't up to the task of running another campaign.
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This ultimately led to him exiting the race and endorsing Harris as his successor, a move that caught the Trump campaign by surprise, as they had planned their entire campaign around going after Biden's fitness.
Re-negotiating the debate schedule became a significant hangup after Harris took over as the Democratic nominee, but ultimately Trump agreed to move forward with debates, and Harris agreed to maintain the format where microphones would be shut off for the candidate not currently answering questions — a format Biden had originally negotiated, but backfired on him as it prevented Trump from going off-script.
