Vice President Kamala Harris began a new week on the campaign trail with renewed calls for another debate with former President Donald Trump.
“I would like another debate,” she told reporters at Andrews Air Force Base on Sunday evening. At a fundraiser earlier in the day, the vice president was more pointed.
“By the way, I think we should have another debate,” Harris said, adding that she had accepted an invitation from CNN that “my opponent seems to be looking for an excuse to avoid when he should accept.”
“I will gladly accept a second presidential debate on October 23,” she wrote in response to a Saturday social media post by CNN’s Kaitlan Collins indicating the Democratic nominee had accepted the network’s invitation. “I hope @realDonaldTrump will join me.”
“The American people deserve another opportunity to see Vice President Kamala Harris and Donald Trump debate before they cast their ballots,” Harris campaign Chairwoman Jen O’Malley Dillon said in a statement.
Trump has now indicated more than once that there will be no second debate with Harris, which would actually be his third in the general election campaign. “The problem with another debate is that it’s just too late, voting has already started,” he said most recently, adding, “Now she wants to do a debate right before the election with CNN because she’s losing badly.”
Whenever Trump has seemed reluctant to debate Harris or has attempted to negotiate with her campaign on the ground rules, the Democrats and much of the media have cried fowl — that is, they have called him a chicken and accused him of ducking the debates.
“What happened to ‘any time, any place?’” Harris asked in a viral post in response to the Bulwark’s Sam Stein reporting on July 25 that the “Trump camp says he’s backing out of the debates.” This was four days after Harris leapfrogged to the top of the ticket, and the Trump camp actually said, “Debate details cannot be finalized until Democrats formally decide on their nominee” at a national convention that had yet to occur.
Trump and Harris ended up debating on ABC News earlier this month. CBS News will hold an Oct. 1 vice presidential debate between Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) and Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN), their respective running mates.
The former president adopted the “any time, any place” standard when President Joe Biden was still his opponent. Trump stuck to it when Biden challenged him to debates on what seemed like favorable terms for the incumbent. Their June 27 debate knocked Biden out of the race, which is how Harris became the Democratic standard-bearer in the first place.
Trump’s Republican primary opponents, most notably former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie of “Donald Duck” fame, similarly tried to taunt him to join them on the debate stage. But Trump was decisively leading them in the polls and Christie himself did not even make it to the New Hampshire primary.
The general election has been closer since Harris ascended to the top of the Democratic ticket, and the impact of a second debate with Trump is uncertain. The Harris campaign obviously liked what it saw in their first encounter when she was a much more disciplined messenger than Trump, and the post-debate news coverage was generally favorable.
At the same time, neither the immediate post-debate focus groups nor the subsequent polling show an unambiguous boost for Harris, even if most scientific surveys score her as the winner of that showdown. The most recent New York Times-Siena College battleground state polls showed Trump ahead in the Sunbelt, which Harris had been believed to put back in play since becoming the Democratic nominee.
The Harris campaign may not believe Trump’s claim that requesting a rematch amounts to an admission of defeat. Trump appeared willing to debate Biden again after June 27, before Harris replaced him. But the desire for another debate suggests that even if the Democrats think they have Trump on the ropes, they know they haven’t scored the knockout yet.
Harris has never adopted the “any time, any place” standard for herself when it comes to any public appearances, much less debates. She did not accept debates hosted by either Fox News or NBC News.
Both candidates are clearly more interested in generating a negative news cycle for their opponent than taking a principled stand in favor of open debate. With the race looking close, both have a heightened interest in the debate ground rules.
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If Harris really wants to debate Trump, she could agree to meet him on Fox. If he refused to appear, Harris’s debate bravado would be more justified. It would also increase the chances of a second Harris-Trump debate actually happening.
There’s an old adage about that which looks, swims, and quacks like a duck, and it applies to a favorite debate-dodging metaphor.