Luck has favoured Donald Trump in the first round of the debate that will pit the Republican against the Democratic candidate, Kamala Harris, on September 10. In a toss-up, the former president’s campaign has emerged the winner, allowing him to choose between closing the debate or choosing his position on the stage. Trump will have the last word, as he did against Joe Biden on June 27. Harris, for her part, has chosen the lectern on the right of the screen, the same one chosen by the current president. Otherwise, the candidates have accepted the same rules as in that duel, including the closing of the microphone of the candidate who does not have the right to speak.
That measure has restricted the debate, which has become a succession of monologues with hardly any exchanges. It was a measure that the Biden campaign demanded for the CNN debate last June, after the cage of crickets that the confrontations of the 2020 campaign seemed like, in which Trump did not stop interrupting him. Precisely the way in which Biden cut Trump off in the first of those debates (“Are you going to shut up, man?”) gave him many points to emerge as the winner. Harris also resorted to a cutting phrase (“I’m speaking”) to get away from Mike Pence’s interruptions in the 2020 vice presidential candidate debate.
Although the measure was imposed by the Biden campaign, it ended up benefiting Trump, who appeared more moderate and restrained. On the other hand, the absence of interruptions did not prevent Biden from sinking alone in a wave of lapses and hesitations that set off alarm bells in the Democratic Party and ended up removing him from the reelection race.
In anticipation of the new debate, Harris’ campaign insisted that microphones be on for the entire debate, but the Republicans’ refusal (despite Trump saying he preferred it) has led to the rules of the debate between Trump and Biden being repeated, which were those agreed upon before the Democratic nomination changeover. Although Harris’ campaign disagrees, it has ended up accepting the situation. “We understand that there is a risk that Donald Trump will skip the debate entirely, as he has threatened to do previously, if we do not agree to his preferred format,” says a campaign message cited by AP. In order not to “jeopardize the debate,” it adds, they accept “the full set of rules proposed by ABC, including muted microphones.”
Next week’s debate is being organised by ABC News. It will be held in Philadelphia, at the National Constitution Center, and will be broadcast at 9pm Eastern Time (3am on Wednesday 11th in mainland Spain) and will be moderated by David Muir, presenter of World News Tonight, and Linsey Davis, presenter of Prime, from ABC News Live. The network has made public on Wednesday the rules that will govern the meeting, the first between the two and, for now, the only one agreed upon.
Candidates will remain standing behind podiums throughout the debate and no props or pre-written notes will be allowed on stage. Each candidate will be provided with a pen, a pad of paper and a bottle of water.
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The debate, which will be closed to the public, will last 90 minutes, with two commercial breaks during which campaign advisers and staff will not be able to interact with the candidates. There will be no opening statements, but instead questions from the moderators will be answered directly. Each candidate will have two minutes to respond to each question, with a two-minute reply and a one-minute counter-reply. Closing speeches will be two minutes long per candidate. Thanks to the coin toss, Trump will have the last word.
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