President Joe Biden has proposed two debates with Donald Trump, issuing the challenge in a video message to his rival, where he mocks him by saying: “I hear you’re free on Wednesdays.”
The judge requires Trump, who is in his fourth week of a secret trial in New York, to be present in court to testify. Wednesday is the only day the court is not in session.
Biden proposes that his first presidential debate be held in late June and his second in September, before early voting begins. He proposes a vice presidential debate in July.
‘Donald Trump lost two debates against me in 2020. He has not appeared in any debates since. He now acts like he wants to debate me. Well, make my day now, I’ll even do it twice. So let’s pick Donald days. I heard you’re free on Wednesdays,” he says in the video.
Trump accepted the offer.
“I’m ready to go,” said the former president Fox News Digital. ‘The dates they proposed are fine. Anywhere. Whenever. Any place. Let’s see if Joe can make it to the podium.
“The proposed dates for June and early September seem totally acceptable to me,” he said. “I will provide my own transportation.”
President Joe Biden challenged Donald Trump to two debates
But the problem is that Biden proposes using a different system than in the past. He wants news organizations to host the debates and not use the traditional system overseen by the Commission on Presidential Debates.
His campaign informed the commission on Wednesday that Biden will not participate in its debates.
“The purpose of this letter is to provide notice that the President will not participate in debates announced by the Commission on Presidential Debates in 2024 and plans to participate in debates hosted by news organizations,” campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon wrote.
O’Malley Dillon notes that the committee’s debate schedule calls for debates to take place after early voting has already begun.
He also complains that the debates have become “big shows with big audiences.”
Biden’s re-election team has expressed concern about the commission’s failure to enforce the rules in the 2020 debate, particularly as it relates to Trump.
In their first debate, hosted by Fox News, Trump repeatedly interrupted Biden during Biden’s allotted speaking time and did not stop, even when moderator Chris Wallace urged him to do so.
At one point, Biden told Trump, ‘Will you shut up, man?’
O’Malley Dillon, in his letter, noted: “The Commission included rules that candidates were required to follow, and yet was unable or unwilling to enforce the rules in the 2020 debates.”
She outlines a plan in which a news network that “hosted a 2016 Republican primary debate featuring Donald Trump, and a 2020 Democratic primary debate featuring President Biden” would lead the debate.
The moderator would be “selected by the broadcast host from among his or her regular staff, to avoid a ‘ringer’ or partisanship.”
The Biden campaign also wants time to be divided evenly and for a candidate’s microphone to only be on when it is their turn to respond.
This would be to prevent Trump from talking about Biden, as he did many times in his 2020 meetings.
Additionally, Biden’s team wants only the two candidates and the moderator in the room. That means no in-person audience (Trump feeds off the applause of a crowd) and no third-party candidates like Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Donald Trump has said he will debate Joe Biden “anytime, anywhere”
“We believe the first debate should take place in late June, after Donald Trump’s criminal trial in New York is likely over and after President Biden returns from meeting world leaders at the G7 Summit,” says O’Malley Dillon of his debate schedule.
‘A second presidential debate should be held in early September, at the start of the fall campaign season, early enough to influence early voting but not so late as to force the candidates to abandon the election campaign in the critical period of late September and October. ‘
Biden had previously been vague about debating Trump, saying in March that whether he debated Trump “depends on his behavior.”
In addition to Trump’s interruption, Biden and his team were furious about the lack of enforcement of COVID protocols around the first presidential debate, which took place during the height of the pandemic.
Hope Hicks, a top Trump adviser, tested positive for COVID before the debate. Trump announced after the debate that he was positive. The second debate was canceled because it was scheduled for a time when Trump would still be considered contagious.
Trump has said he is willing to debate Biden “anytime, anywhere.”
The commission scheduled its debates for September 16, October 1 and October 9.
The Trump campaign has also complained about those dates.
In April, Trump campaign co-chairs Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita wrote to the commission calling for earlier debates, noting that “voting is starting earlier and earlier and, as we saw in 2020, tens of millions of Americans had already voted.” at the time of the vote. the first debate.’
“By the date of the first proposed debate, September 16, 2024, more than 1 million Americans will likely have voted,” Wiles and LaCivita wrote. “By the date of the proposed second debate, October 1, 2024, the number of Americans likely to have voted will be more than 3 million, an increase of 225%.”
The Trump campaign has pushed for as many debates as possible, believing they will help their candidate and show Biden as old and weak.
The commission has managed presidential debates since 1988.
Joe Biden’s team has expressed concern about the commission’s failure to enforce the rules in the 2020 debate, particularly regarding Donald Trump, who repeatedly interrupted Biden’s speaking time, over the two men in a debate in Cleveland in September 20202.
In the 2020 race, Biden and Trump debated twice.
More than 73 million people watched the two men during their first debate, down from the 84 million who watched Trump face Hillary Clinton in 2016.
But presidential debates are typically among the most-watched television broadcasts of the year, surpassing events like the Oscars.
A television network is the host and the event is usually simulcast on all major broadcast and cable networks.
If none are held, this year’s election could be the first in 50 years without a debate between general election candidates.
