Donald Trump, Joe Biden debate marked by clashes, but less chaos
After the first presidential debate was panned so widely that organizers introduced a mute button, Thursday’s second and final debate between President Donald Trump and Democratic challenger Joe Biden was far more civil. Whether because of that button or the terrible reviews — especially for Trump — the two interrupted each other far less frequently, even as they clashed on issues ranging from the coronavirus to crime. Trump, in particular, was on his best behavior early, especially with the moderator, whom he’d repeatedly attacked before the debate. “So far, I respect very much the way you’re handling this,” Trump said to NBC’s Kristen Welker when she gave him time to respond to Biden at one point. Because of the pandemic, only around 200 people were seated inside the debate hall in the massive college arena in Nashville. That included a representative of the Commission on Presidential Debates, who was tasked with ensuring each candidate had a two full minutes of uninterrupted time to deliver opening answers on six major topics, according to debate commission chair Frank Fahrenkopf. And it seemed to be working, at least during the debate’s opening questions. While Trump and Biden each shook his head disapprovingly during the other’s answer about the pandemic, there was minimal interruption. And neither man tried to speak while he was muted during the opening questions. A member of each of the Trump and Biden campaigns monitored the person who controlled the mute button backstage, Fahrenkopf told The Associated Press, noting that the button would not be used beyond the first four minutes of each topic. The button was among a handful of changes implemented by the nonpartisan debate commission to help ensure a more orderly debate following the raucous and widely criticized opening debate 23 days ago. Trump was diagnosed with COVID-19 two days after the event, and he and the White House have refused to say whether he abided by commission rules and tested negative for the virus before that debate. This time, Trump was given a test aboard Air Force One en route to Nashville Thursday and tested negative, White House chief of staff Mark Meadows said. Biden’s campaign reported he also tested negative. Organizers initially planned to separate the candidates with plexiglass barriers, but removed them hours before the debate began. A Trump campaign official said the decision was made after Meadows called Anthony Fauci, the nation’s highly respected top infectious diseases expert, during a walkthrough of the venue site. Meadows them put Fauci on speakerphone, and Fauci told those in the room that all it would do was provide a false sense of security, the person said. Additionally, any audience member who refused to wear a mask would be removed, organizers said. Last month, several members of the Trump family removed their masks once seated in the debate hall, but were allowed to stay. This time, Melania Trump, who was appearing in public for the first time since her own diagnosis with the virus, was seen in her seat wearing a mask. Before the debate began, Fahrenkopf repeated the instruction to the small audience. “If you won’t leave, you’ll be escorted,” he said. Fahrenkopf said in an earlier interview that the safety measures would help reduce the risk of infection. “The Trump campaign’s attitude was that the president was not contagious anymore, but we’re going to go with our medical advisers,” he said. Indeed, the president of the university called it “the safest place in America tonight.” The primetime affair played out inside a 90,000-square-foot (8,360-square-meter) arena at Belmont University, a picturesque institution of more than 8,200 students just a mile from Nashville’s music row. The university also hosted a town hall-style debate between Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain in 2008. There was a far smaller audience this time around. Only around 200 people were allowed inside, a mix of invited guests of the campaigns and the debate commission, students, the commission’s production team, security, and health and safety personnel. Audience members were seated in accordance with social distancing recommendations; several empty seats separated each person or small group. All audience members and support staff were required to undergo coronavirus testing onsite within three days of the event. They wore colored wristbands as evidence of their negative tests. There were several layers of security protecting the attendees, and dozens of protesters gathered just off campus beyond the security perimeter. One of them held a large white sign: “220,000 DEAD … Trump FAILED US.” Republished with the permission of the Associated Press.
Face to face: Donald Trump and Joe Biden to meet for final debate
President Donald Trump and his Democratic challenger, Joe Biden, are set to square off in their final debate Thursday, one of the last high-profile opportunities for the trailing incumbent to change the trajectory of an increasingly contentious campaign. Worried about losing the White House, some advisers are urging Trump to trade his aggressive demeanor from the first debate for a lower-key style that puts Biden more squarely in the spotlight. But it’s unclear whether the president will listen. Biden, who has stepped off the campaign trail in favor of debate prep, expects Trump to get intensely personal. The former vice president and his inner circle see the president’s approach chiefly as an effort to distract from the coronavirus, its economic fallout, and other crises. With less than two weeks until Election Day, Biden is leading most national polls and has a narrower advantage in the battleground states that could decide the race. More than 42 million people have already cast their ballots. The debate, moderated by NBC’s Kristen Welker, is a final chance for both men to make their case to a television audience of tens of millions of voters. “The rule is that last debates before the election have a big impact,” said presidential historian Michael Beschloss, who made clear the legacy of the candidates’ first faceoff: “That was the most out-of-control presidential debate we have seen.” Trump, who staged a remarkable comeback in the closing days of the 2016 campaign, believes he can do it again by using the power of the presidency to attack his rival. Trump on Tuesday called on Attorney General William Barr to immediately launch an investigation into unverified claims about Biden and his son Hunter Biden, effectively demanding that the Justice Department muddy his political opponent and abandon its historic resistance to getting involved in elections. The president has promoted an unconfirmed New York Post report published last week that cites an email in which an official from Ukrainian gas company Burisma thanked Hunter Biden, who served on the company’s board, for arranging for him to meet Joe Biden during a 2015 visit to Washington. The Biden campaign has rejected Trump’s assertion of wrongdoing and noted that Biden’s schedule did not show a meeting with the Burisma official. Some former national security officials and other experts said the episode raised multiple red flags of a possible foreign disinformation effort, especially given the involvement of Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s personal attorney, and Giuliani’s active role in promoting an anti-Biden narrative on Ukraine. But John Ratcliffe, the director of national intelligence, dismissed that disinformation theory. And the FBI appeared to endorse Ratcliffe’s position in a letter to a Senate committee that had requested information on a laptop purportedly belonging to Hunter Biden. Trump’s attacks on the Biden family have been relentless, including his efforts to get Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden, which led to Trump’s impeachment. It’s part of a determined, yet so-far-unsuccessful effort to drive up his opponent’s negatives, as he did with Hillary Clinton four years ago. Trump campaign communications director Tim Murtaugh said, “Trump is still the political outsider, while Biden is the ultimate insider. We now know that Biden allowed his son to sell access to him while he was vice president.” While Biden will defend his own record and his son, aides have said, he hopes to focus on making the case that Trump is unfit for office and let the nation down during a confluence of crises. “He knows that people want to hear about how we’re going to help working families get through the end of the month and pay the rent,” his running mate, Sen. Kamala Harris, said Wednesday in North Carolina. “That’s what people care about, and one of the things I love about Joe Biden — he doesn’t take on or talk about other people’s kids.” The one-two punch of the first debate and the president’s three-day hospital stint after contracting COVID-19 rattled his base of support and triggered alarm among Republicans who fear the White House and Senate could be slipping away. The initial debate was the most tumultuous in modern history, with a belligerent tone that was persistent and somehow fitting for what has been an extraordinarily ugly campaign. Amid heated clashes over the pandemic, the Supreme Court, and the integrity of the election itself, Trump refused to condemn white supremacists who have supported him, telling one such group known as the Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by.” The two men frequently talked over each other with Trump interrupting, nearly shouting, so often that Biden eventually snapped at him, “Will you shut up, man?” Aides have urged Trump, who has skipped debate prep, to show some restraint this time, allowing Biden to speak more and get himself in trouble with verbal gaffes and lapses. But the president has made no promises. “Some people think, ‘Let him talk,’ because he loses his train (of thought), he just loses it and he doesn’t speak the train of thought,” Trump said in a town hall discussion taped at the White House Rose Garden and aired by Sinclair Broadcast Group on Wednesday evening. “But we’ll see what happens. I mean, you will have to be there.” It was two days after the first debate in Cleveland when Trump tested positive for the coronavirus. The White House has refused to reveal when the president had last tested negative before the debate, raising questions as to whether he was already infected when he took the stage. After the diagnosis, the Commission on Presidential Debates ruled that the second debate, which was to have been held last week, be virtual. Trump balked, leading to the cancellation of the debate and the two men holding dueling town halls instead, speaking at the same time more than 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometers) apart. On the debate stage Wednesday, two large plexiglass shields had been put in place in front of the candidates’ lecterns. On Thursday night, in an effort to curtail interruptions, Trump and Biden will each have
Debate commission says it will make changes to format
The commission said Wednesday that the debate “made clear that additional structure should be added to the format of the remaining debates to ensure a more orderly discussion of the issues.”
