Trump says his debate strategy is to give Harris room to speak

Donald Trump said he plans to allow his opponent, Kamala Harris, to speak without interruption during their presidential debate next week, a shift for the reality-television-star-turned-politician who built a career on combative exchanges.

“I’m going to let her talk,” Trump said Wednesday at a taping of a town hall in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, with Fox News’ Sean Hannity. “Debates are interesting, you can go in with all the strategy you want, but you have to sort of feel it out.”

The Sept. 10 debate hosted by ABC News is the next big test for the two candidates. That forum has already been the center of a row over the rules for microphones, and with Trump claiming the network is biased in favor of Harris.

Trump also left a little room for him to change his plan for the event, adding Wednesday: “Mike Tyson made the statement, ‘everyone has a plan until you’re punched in the face.’”

Trump in the past has resisted the traditional debate planning employed by presidential campaigns, involving detailed policy briefings and mock exchanges. Instead, he’s preferred to have less formal preparation from his team and rely more on his own intuition. He refused to debate his Republican rivals during the 2024 primary battle.

The high-stakes confrontation is the first — and potentially only — opportunity for the two candidates to spar in-person in a very close contest. With only two months until Election Day, they have few opportunities to sway the small sliver of persuadable voters.

The debate presents risks for both Harris and Trump. The former president has been chastised by both allies and critics for attacks on Harris that criticize her intelligence, gender and racial identity that could alienate key voters. The vice president has largely been untested as a presidential candidate in unscripted settings, only doing one television interview since she became the Democratic nominee.

Debate About Debates

Trump had originally agreed to the ABC News debate with President Joe Biden, then the Democratic candidate. For weeks, he suggested he might not show up for the debate with Harris, before saying he would participate after all. Trump and Biden held one debate, a calamitous performance for the sitting president that led members of his own party to push him out of the race.

For weeks, the campaigns have clashed over the rules for the microphones. Harris’ camp has sought to keep both candidates’ microphones live throughout the broadcast, while Trump’s team has pushed for them to be muted when they were not answering questions, as they were during the June Biden-Trump debate on CNN.

ABC News released the rules on Wednesday, which said that the microphones would be “live only for the candidate whose turn it is to speak and muted when the time belongs to another candidate.” Candidates have two minutes to answer questions, two minutes to rebut and one-minute for follow-ups or clarifications, according to the network.

The Harris campaign in a letter to ABC said that the muted microphones would disadvantage Harris and shield Trump from having to directly engage with the vice president, according to a campaign official. Harris’ team was concerned that Trump would skip the debate if they didn’t agree to having the mics silenced, and said that if there is significant cross-talk, the network might unmute the candidates, so that the audience can understand what’s happening, the official said.

Trump has floated other debates, including with Fox News. The Harris campaign has ruled out participating in a forum on that network but has proposed a second debate, with the details to be resolved if Trump takes part in the ABC event.

Swing States

The debate will take place in Philadelphia, the largest city in Pennsylvania, one of the most critical swing states. Trump’s town hall appearance Wednesday marks his second visit there in as many weeks. The two nominees are in a pitched fight for the state’s working-class voters, some of them uneasy with Biden’s economic agenda and drawn to Trump’s populist appeals.

Harris campaigned in the western part of the state on Labor Day with Biden and is returning on Thursday for the 10th time this year, according to her campaign. The state is the most populous of the seven core battlegrounds, offering 19 Electoral College votes.

Trump’s team has acknowledged polls showing the race has grown more competitive. A Bloomberg News/Morning Consult poll released late August found Harris overtaking Trump in Pennsylvania by 51% to 47%. Republican National Committee co-chair Lara Trump, on Bloomberg Television’s Balance of Power last week, said the party would consider putting more money and attention into “must-win” battlegrounds such as Pennsylvania.

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(With assistance from Hadriana Lowenkron and Jennifer Epstein.)