'Will you be there?' CNN host calls Trump adviser's bluff on pledge to another debate
CNN's Kasie Hunt pressed Donald Trump's senior campaign adviser Jason Miller to commit to another debate with Kamala Harris.
The candidates wrangled over the conditions for Tuesday night's debate for weeks, with Trump proposing alternate debates instead, although Harris never agreed to those invitations, and Miller insisted the former president was prepared to go ahead for one of those proposed dates Sept. 25 on NBC.
"I'd like to start with this issue you can you put it to rest," Hunt began. "Will Donald Trump participate in a second debate with Kamala Harris before Nov. 5?"
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Trump had threatened to pull out of the ABC News debate after president Joe Biden dropped out of the race, and proposed an alternate debate on Fox News, before a live audience, to which Harris never agreed.
"Well, Kasie, I thought this is a bit perplexing because president Trump has already said that he is going to do three debates," Miller said. "We had the Sept. 4 debate, which was going to be on Fox, and Kamala Harris was a no-show. We had last night and president Trump already said that on Sept. 25, we would do a debate on NBC, you see, but now Kamala Harris seems to have memory-holed that and rather than just saying, we will see you on Sept. 25 on NBC, is now throwing out some fictional day in October. So very clearly we're gonna have to go back to the drawing board. We've already committed Sept. 25th against NBC."
Hunt asked the campaign adviser whether Trump would debate her if Harris agreed to that proposal.
"Will you be there?" Hunt asked.
"We've already committed to Sept. 25 with NBC, but here's the thing," Miller said. "The reason why Kamala Harris is doing it is because she had two goals last night, and she didn't land either one. No. 1, she had to find a way to break free from Joe Biden, when the wrong track in the country of two-thirds of the voters saying going the wrong track, one-third right track. It's not enough just to lay out a policy position. You have to say how you're going to change direction, how you're going to break free of Joe Biden. The second thing that Kamala Harris had to do, what she didn't was explain after three and a half years of being there, why she hasn't done it already. So, of course, Kamala Harris is going to come back to clean those two things up. It's not enough to give some platitudinous answer. You have to say how you're going to change direction especially on the economy and immigration. She failed to do that.
"I hear the points that you're making," Hunt replied. "I just want to circle back one more time. If Kamala Harris agrees to the Sept. 25 NBC debate, will Donald Trump be there?"
Miller again said Trump had agreed to three debates but Harris had not shown up to the first, although she had not agreed to the terms he laid out, and the vice president's team has proposed a second debate for October.
"You can't give Kamala Harris credit for saying that she'll do some fictional debate a month, a month and a half to two months down the road, maybe on election eve, because Kamala Harris is not going to show up," Miller said. "President Trump agreed to three debates, the next one being Sept. 25 on NBC, Kamala Harris clearly refuses to do that, saying that there'll be some fictional day in the future Sept. 25, the onus here is on Kamala Harris to quit playing games, quit running show up on Sept. 25. She's not going to do it."
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