Former President Donald Trump’s campaign is casting fresh doubt on whether a September 10 debate will take place on ABC amid a dispute over the rules, a source familiar with the matter tells CNN.
Trump’s team, according to the source, would like for the microphones to be muted throughout the debate except for the candidate whose turn it is to speak, as was the case during the first debate with President Joe Biden.
The Harris campaign, however, is requesting that ABC and other networks seeking to host a potential October debate keep microphones on, according to a senior campaign official, marking a change from the June debate when the then-Biden campaign wanted microphones muted except when it was a candidate’s turn to speak.
“We have told ABC and other networks seeking to host a possible October debate that we believe both candidates’ mics should be live throughout the full broadcast,” Brian Fallon, the Harris campaign’s senior adviser for communications, said in a statement.
“Our understanding is that Trump’s handlers prefer the muted microphone because they don’t think their candidate can act presidential for 90 minutes on his own. We suspect Trump’s team has not even told their boss about this dispute because it would be too embarrassing to admit they don’t think he can handle himself against Vice President Harris without the benefit of a mute button,” he said.
Trump’s campaign has argued that when they agreed to the ABC debate with Harris at the top of the ticket, they were agreeing to the same guidelines of the previous debate.
“Enough with the games. We accepted the ABC debate under the exact same terms as the CNN debate,” Trump campaign senior adviser Jason Miller said in a statement.
This is a breaking story and will be updated.
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