Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. President Donald Trump and U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris.
Andrew Kelly | Evelyn Hockstein | Reuters
Vice President Kamala Harris‘ presidential campaign called out Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump on Saturday for refusing to agree to a scheduled Sept. 10 debate hosted by ABC News, and instead trying to pressure her to accept an earlier debate on Trump friendly Fox News.
Trump on Friday announced on Truth Social that he had agreed with Fox News to do a Sept. 4 debate against Harris, the de facto Democratic presidential nominee, with Fox News moderators and a full audience in attendance.
“Donald Trump is running scared and trying to back out of the debate he already agreed to and running straight to Fox News to bail him out,” Harris campaign spokesman Michael Tyler said, in a statement on Saturday.
Trump cited ongoing litigation with ABC News as creating a “conflict of interest.” Fox News did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
“He needs to stop playing games and show up to the debate he already committed to on Sept 10. The Vice President will be there one way or the other to take the opportunity to speak to a prime time national audience,” Tyler said.
The Trump campaign responded to the statement by accusing the Harris campaign of being cowardly.
“Sounds like @KamalaHarris and @KamalaHQ are too chicken s— to accept an earlier debate,” Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung wrote Saturday on X.
President Joe Biden and Trump in May agreed to two debates on mutually accepted terms, one hosted by CNN on June 27 and the second by ABC News on Sept. 10. Though Biden has since exited the race due to his own disastrous debate performance in June, the Harris campaign has maintained that the terms of the May deal still hold.
Days after Biden dropped out and endorsed Harris, Trump said he would be willing to debate the vice president multiple times. As Harris has gained in the polls and hauled in record fundraising, Trump has repeatedly walked back that initial May agreement and teased the idea of skipping the debates altogether.
The Harris campaign has said that the vice president will show up at the Sept. 10 debate whether Trump is there or not.
“It’s interesting how ‘any time, any place’ becomes ‘one specific time, one specific safe space,'” Harris wrote in an X post on Saturday, doubling down. “I’ll be there on September 10th, like he agreed to. I hope to see him there.”
Tyler added that the campaign would be open to negotiating further debates after the two complete the ABC News debate: “Mr. Anytime, anywhere, anyplace should have no problem with that unless he’s too scared to show up on the 10th.”
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