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topicnews · August 28, 2024

Will there be hot mics at the presidential debate? It’s complicated.

Will there be hot mics at the presidential debate? It’s complicated.

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Former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris will face off in a debate on September 10, hosted by ABC News in Philadelphia and moderated by Linsey Davis and David Muir.

In recent days, however, campaign teams have been debating changes to a set of rules that Trump and President Joe Biden agreed to before their June debate, amid comments from Trump that cast doubt on his ultimate participation.

What were the rules of the last debate between Biden and Trump?

The rules for the final debate required that each candidate’s microphone be turned on only when it was their turn to speak. There was no studio audience and candidates were not allowed to speak to their staff or bring notes during breaks.

Both candidates only had a pen, a pad and a bottle of water at their disposal.

The Biden team had asked for the microphones to be turned off in response to Trump’s tendency to interrupt and interrupt his opponents in 2016 and 2020.

The Associated Press reported that some of Biden’s aides are now questioning that decision because Trump’s unmuted interruptions may have hurt him more than his opponent.

What is the disagreement regarding the rules for the upcoming debate?

Harris’ communications adviser Brian Fallon said the campaign wants the microphones at both candidates’ lecterns to remain on throughout the debate.

“Trump’s advisers prefer the silent microphone because they don’t believe their candidate can act as president for 90 minutes alone,” Fallon said.

The vice president is “ready to confront Trump’s constant lies and interruptions in real time. Trump should stop hiding behind the mute button,” he said.

Jason Miller, a Trump campaign spokesman, said Trump accepted the Sept. 10 ABC debate under the same conditions he accepted the CNN debate against Biden in June.

Miller accused the Harris campaign of wanting a “sit-down debate with notes.” The Harris campaign denies this.

Yet Trump recently said he didn’t care much about the microphone policy.

“We agreed to the same rules” as in the debate in June, Trump said on Sunday in a video released by CNN in response to questions from reporters.

“I don’t care, I probably would have preferred (the microphone) on, but the agreement was that it would be the same as last time. In this case, it was muted. I didn’t like that last time, but it worked out fine,” Trump said.

“They’re trying to change it. In reality, they’re trying to get out of it because she doesn’t want to debate.”

Why is the debate organization so different this year than in previous years?

The bipartisan Commission on Presidential Debates has been organizing presidential debates for decades—since 1988. This year, for the first time, the rules for the debates will be set in semi-public, three-party negotiations between a handful of television networks and both campaigns.

Since the creation of the Commission on Presidential Debates, most debates have had microphones on for both candidates.

In the second of two debates between Trump and Biden in 2020, the microphone was muted for the non-speaking candidate after the first debate without such a rule became problematic and argumentative.

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