After a lot of tough talk, Donald Trump appears to be afraid to debate Vice President Kamala Harris, the presumptive Democratic presidential candidate. A few months ago, President Joe Biden and Donald Trump agreed to two general election debates, the first of which took place on June 27. The second was to be held on September 10 and hosted by ABC News. But after Biden announced he was not running for reelection and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris to be the Democratic candidate, Trump began to change his tune. On Sunday, Trump said he’d be willing to debate Harris multiple times but suggested that the ABC News debate should be moved to Fox News, whose prime-time hosts have been very friendly to Mr. Trump. “I’m not thrilled about ABC because [of] fake news I watched last night,” Trump said. “They’re actually trying to make a hero out of Joe Biden when he was the worst president in history, and they were doing things like with Kamala, like what a wonderful thing that she is running.”
Trump says he is willing to debate Harris multiple times https://t.co/nhDbiUwxkI
— CNBC (@CNBC) July 23, 2024
On Thursday, VP Harris publicly committed to the ABC debate telling reporters, “I think the voters deserve to see the split screen that exists in this race on the debate stage.” She added that Mr. Trump appeared to be “backpedaling” to get out of the debate. Following Harris’s remarks, Team Trump issued a statement last night maintaining there was “continued political chaos surrounding” Biden and the Democrats, so “general election debate details cannot be finalized until Democrats formally decide on their nominee.” Even though the Democratic party has coalesced around Harris as the presumptive nominee, the Trump campaign alleges that “they are still holding out for someone ‘better.’” The statement added: “Therefore, it would be inappropriate to schedule things with Harris because Democrats very well could still change their minds.” 
During an appearance on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg called Trump’s waffling another example of Trump’s empty “tough talk.”
“Tough talk is this guy’s calling card and now there’s this extraordinary show of weakness. He said anytime, anyplace, but more than that, he agreed to this specific debate, on this specific network, on this specific date, and now he’s pulling out.”
“It shows that he’s afraid. It shows that he knows that if the two of them are on a stage together, it’s not going to end well for him.”
Pete Buttigieg on Morning Joe on Trump backpedaling on debating Harris: “It’s extraordinary. Tough talk is this guy’s calling card, and there’s this extraordinary show of weakness.” pic.twitter.com/RKHD8j3xny
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 26, 2024
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