The Harris campaign continued to play games with debate rules on Wednesday by refusing to agree on having muted microphones at the September 10 debate on ABC.
Former President Donald Trump said Tuesday that he reached an agreement with the “Radical Left Democrats” on the debate rules after the Harris campaign suddenly attempted to change the rules on Sunday from muted to unmuted microphones.
On Wednesday, the Harris campaign remained non-committal about the microphones.
“Both candidates have publicly made clear their willingness to debate with unmuted mics for the duration of the debate to fully allow for substantive exchanges between the candidates – but it appears Donald Trump is letting his handlers overrule him. Sad!” Harris campaign spokesman Ammar Moussa said.
Harris wants an unmuted mic to save her from word salads, one person familiar with Harris’s negotiations told Politico Playbook.
“She’s more than happy to have exchanges with him if he tries to interrupt her,” the person said. “And given how shook he seems by her, he’s very prone to having intemperate outbursts and … I think the campaign would want viewers to hear [that].”
More is here on Harris’s word salads.
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The dispute goes back to when President Joe Biden was still in the race. Both candidates agreed on two debates (CNN on June 27 and ABC on September 10), with Biden insisting that microphones “be muted throughout the debate except for the candidate whose turn it is to speak,” CNN reported on June 15.
After the Trump and Harris campaigns agreed to keep the September debate, the Harris campaign requested on Sunday that ABC News and other networks unmute candidates’ microphones, CNN reported, an idea the Trump campaign opposed in a statement to Playbook.
“Enough with the games. We accepted the ABC debate under the exact same terms as the CNN debate,” senior adviser for Trump Jason Miller told Politico Playbook on Sunday night. “The Harris camp, after having already agreed to the CNN rules, asked for a seated debate, with notes, and opening statements. We said no changes to the agreed upon rules.”
Wendell Husebo is a political reporter with Breitbart News and a former RNC War Room Analyst. He is the author of Politics of Slave Morality. Follow Wendell on “X” @WendellHusebø or on Truth Social @WendellHusebo.
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