HARRISBURG, Pa. — Hours after the Trump and Harris campaigns agreed to rules for their first presidential debate, former President Donald Trump sought to instill doubt that the debate would be fair, downplayed his need to prepare and suggested he was more worried about the network hosting the debate than his opponent.
Speaking at a Fox News town hall Wednesday night, Trump insisted that ABC News, which will host next week’s debate in Philadelphia, was “dishonest,” even though he agreed months ago to allow the network to host a presidential debate.
Pointing to Vice President Kamala Harris’ longtime friendship with a senior executive whose portfolio includes ABC News, Trump insisted without evidence that Harris was “going to get the questions in advance.” The network released agreed-upon rules that no topics or questions would be provided to either candidate or campaign.
Trump’s attempts to question the integrity of the debate echoed a similar effort that preceded his consequential debate in June with President Joe Biden that set off the president’s exit from the race. After taunting Biden into debating “anytime, anywhere, anyplace,” Trump sought to play down any potential political consequences as the debate neared by casting the network, moderators and rules as biased.
“Beyond the debate rules published today, which were mutually agreed upon by two campaigns on May 15th, we have made no other agreements,” an ABC News spokesperson said Wednesday night. “We look forward to moderating the presidential debate next Tuesday.”
Yet even as he suggested the debate next week would be biased against him, Trump also tried to present himself as unconcerned about his first head-to-head confrontation with Harris since she became the Democratic nominee. He insisted that planning would only get him so far and that he would take a similar approach to Harris that he did to Biden.
“I let him talk — I’m going to let her talk,” Trump told the town hall’s moderator, Fox News host Sean Hannity. Trump, who has repeatedly mocked Harris’ intelligence and speaking style, added, “There are those that say that Biden is smarter than she is. If that’s the case, we have a problem.”
Trump’s town hall, in front of an audience in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, began with an interview by Hannity, a longtime Trump ally with whom the former president has a yearslong friendship. Trump then answered five prescreened questions from members of the audience, including the state’s Republican Senate candidate, David McCormick. The interview portion was broadcast on Fox News on Wednesday evening, and the audience questions are set to run Thursday evening.
For the bulk of his speaking time, Trump repeated talking points from his rallies, though he occasionally expanded on them.
As he often does, Trump cited the praise of Hungary’s far-right prime minister, Viktor Orban, whom critics have said has been leading his nation toward authoritarianism, as proof that world leaders preferred his leadership on foreign affairs to Biden’s.
Describing Orban as a “strongman,” Trump, who has praised contemporary strongmen leaders and whose violent and authoritarian rhetoric on the campaign trail has raised alarm from his critics, added, “sometimes you need a strongman.”
As Trump sat in Pennsylvania, a large producer of natural gas, he vowed to increase oil and gas production, then again attacked Harris for calling for a ban on hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, during her 2020 presidential campaign.
Though Harris has since said she no longer supports such a ban, Trump said that Pennsylvania “can’t take the chance.” Both campaigns are eyeing the battleground state as critical to their paths to victory in November.
Trump continued to insist that other countries were deliberately sending violent criminals and mentally ill people across the border, a claim that there is no evidence to support, and he accused Harris of failing to curb the number of migrants crossing illegally.
“She was the border czar,” Trump said, using a misleading phrase that Republicans have used to describe Harris’ role in being asked to address the “root causes” of migration.
Then, acknowledging that Harris was never formally given that title, Trump added that “even if you don’t want to use that term, she was in charge of the border.”
Trump also spent significant time looking backward to when Biden was his opponent. Harris had visited New Hampshire on Wednesday, and Trump criticized Biden over his role in the Democratic National Committee’s decision to move the state from the top of the Democrats’ primary calendar.
“Who the hell in New Hampshire would vote for this guy?” he asked, even though Biden will no longer be on the ballot there in November.
Trump’s town hall was meant to stand in for a debate that he had proposed on Fox News as part of an effort to pull out of the ABC News debate he had initially agreed to with Biden. The Harris campaign rejected his proposal and insisted Trump uphold his commitment to the ABC debate, which will take place next Tuesday in Philadelphia. Trump has also proposed a debate on NBC News later this month, which Harris has so far not agreed to.
The town hall on Fox was part of a larger attempt by the Trump campaign to attack Harris for avoiding media scrutiny.
Trump and his allies have criticized her commitment to only one debate, her not holding a news conference since becoming the Democratic presidential nominee and her decision to wait a month before giving a mainstream media interview.
Though she took part in an interview last week on CNN, Trump allies have criticized her for fielding it alongside her running mate, Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
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