Kamala Harris is desperate for a repeat of her debate with Mike Pence in 2020, where she was able to portray herself as the battered woman candidate who was being mansplained and bullied. It was all fabricated and almost certainly planned, but it became her signature:
In the two debates scheduled for Joe Biden and Trump, one of the rules was that there would be no talk-over – the mics would be muted when it was not the candidate’s time to speak. That rule, as all the rules, was demanded by Biden. I didn’t think that would be good for Trump, who likes a freewheeling debate style, but it turned out to be great for him.
When Biden dropped out of the race and Kamala was anointed the nominee, her team demanded that Trump stick to the September 10 ABC News debate. Trump eventually agreed.
But then Harris demanded a rule change. She doesn’t want the muted mics even though that was part of the rules agreed up for the ABC News debate. Her team has been pushing the theme that Trump is either afraid or unable to control himself.
In fact, a debate with no cross-talk is a major risk for Kamala. There’s nothing so scary for her campaign as Kamala having to fill time with words.
According to the NY Post, ABC News has rejected Kamala’s demand for a rule change.
ABC News has declined to adopt Vice President Kamala Harris’ request to have wholly unmuted microphones during her Sept. 10 debate with former President Donald Trump — after days of wrangling over what Republicans viewed as Democratic attempts to lay a trap for the GOP nominee.A network email reviewed by The Post lays out similar rules as those for Trump’s June 27 CNN debate against President Biden — including no audience, no pre-written notes or props and muted mics when a candidate is not speaking.Trump and Harris will be standing on stage and will only be allowed to have a pen, a pad of paper and a bottle of water.The Republican campaign had insisted the debate — set to be held at Philadelphia’s National Constitution Center — follow the same rules as the June showdown with Biden.However, Harris’ team claimed Monday that they wanted both candidates’ mics on for the entire 90-minute forum.A top Trump ally said ABC News had informed both campaigns in writing last week that it would employ the “CNN rules” and both had confirmed that Sept. 10 was a “go.”“At this point, Team Harris is going to be taking an ‘L’ when they finally accept, as the debate rules aren’t changing, or they’ll take an even bigger ‘L’ if they back out of the debate because the Dana Bash/CNN interview goes poorly,” the person said.The email seen by The Post was sent Tuesday by ABC News Chief Counsel Eric Lieberman. It reiterated the rules and asked the campaigns for their “formal acceptance.”
AP and other news outlets are reporting the same.
So what will Kamala do? Will she back out, or figure out some other way to play the victim card at the debate?
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