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GOP
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Yesterday morning, Donald Trump appeared on Fox, and told Maria Bartiromo that he didn't see a need for another presidential debate. His reasons: (1) his so-called "big lead" in the polls, (2) everyone knows both him and Kamala Harris and (3) Why should I?
Apparently, that approach did not sit well with... someone. Maybe many someones. Because yesterday evening, Trump sent out this message:
I have agreed with FoxNews to debate Kamala Harris on Wednesday, September 4th. The Debate was previously scheduled against Sleepy Joe Biden on ABC, but has been terminated in that Biden will no longer be a participant, and I am in litigation against ABC Network and George Slopadopoulos, thereby creating a conflict of interest. The FoxNews Debate will be held in the Great Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, at a site in an area to be determined. The Moderators of the Debate will be Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum, and the Rules will be similar to the Rules of my Debate with Sleepy Joe, who has been treated horribly by his Party - BUT WITH A FULL ARENA AUDIENCE!...
In case you are wondering, the lawsuit Trump is referring to is one in which he claims that George Stephanopoulos is guilty of defamation because he called Trump a rapist. In fact, the finding in court was that Trump committed sexual assault, not rape. The case survived summary judgment, but taking it to trial would be a disaster for the former president, so presumably he'll drop it at some point.
Needless to say, whether or not ABC is party to a lawsuit involving Trump, it has nothing to do with the debate, since Stephanopoulos is not scheduled to moderate. This is just another example of The Donald grasping at some random, vaguely plausible straw in order to weasel his way out of a commitment. If you can see a substantive difference between "I can't stick to my debate commitment because of my lawsuit against ABC" and "I can't stick to my promise to release my taxes because I am being audited," you are cleverer than we are.
The real message here is that Trump is scared to death of debating Kamala Harris, and is trying to do everything he can to give himself an out ("I tried to debate her, but she wouldn't do it!") or, failing that, to give himself as much an advantage as is possible. Note that he not only wants to enjoy the friendly confines of Fox, he wants an audience. He knows full well that a Fox audience would do all kinds of hootin' and hollerin' every time Trump said anything.
And allow us to note here that most of the headlines for this story say something like "Trump Agrees to Fox Debate." We find this characterization to be problematic. What he did was unilaterally change the terms of the debate, without bothering to discuss or negotiate with Kamala Harris. What if we said that (V) and (Z) had agreed to purchase eX-Twitter from Elon Musk for $1? It ain't an agreement if the other party doesn't know anything about it.
There are a few ways that Harris could play this. The first option is to refuse to allow Trump to dictate terms as he sees fit, and to make clear that she's sticking with the original plan, which both she and Trump agreed to at various times. There are all kinds of pointed things she could say. For example:
Donald's doing it again—making a commitment, and then failing to honor it. 40 years' worth of Trump business partners know all about this.
It's weird that Donald is afraid to debate me. Very weird.
Why is Donald so scared? How come he needs to have Fox holding his hand? When you're president, there's no hand-holding when you have to deal with Xi Jinping or Narendra Modi. I would think I am far less scary than them.
Who would have thought that a woman candidate has bigger balls than Donald Trump?
Harris has shown she has no problems needling Trump, and this would present endless opportunities to do so.
Alternatively, Harris could agree to debate on Fox on September 4. Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum are very poor moderators, and would be partly in the bag for Trump. But they are not 100% bad-faith operators, like Sean Hannity or Laura Ingraham would be. Harris would still have the potential to wreck Trump, even on Fox's airwaves. And if she did it, having gone into the lion's den, that would certainly heighten her victory.
A third option would be for Harris to announce that she already has a commitment on September 4, and that maybe a viable date for her to debate could have been found, if anyone bothered to check with her. In any event, she could say, given her very full schedule, she is going to dispatch her running mate to debate Trump instead. If Trump agrees, he gets the indignity of appearing on stage with the junior varsity. And if Trump refuses, then it's a round of "Wow. He's not only afraid to debate Kamala Harris, he's ALSO afraid to debate [RUNNING MATE]. He's frightened of the ENTIRE ticket."
Presumably, Harris will respond, one way or another, sometime in the next few days. This weekend, however, she's busy interviewing running mates, so she probably doesn't have time for Trump's silly games. (Z)