Connect with us

CELEBRITY

Harris, Trump to clash in debate Tuesday

Published

on

It will be the first time the United States Vice President, Kamala Harris, and former President Donald Trump meet in person on Tuesday — and millions of Americans will get a ringside seat.

The Democratic VP and Republican former president will face off in Philadelphia in their first and possibly only televised debate before what promises to be a nail-bitingly close 2024 election.

The high-stakes ABC debate will be a chance for US voters to finally see the two go head-to-head, after a month of shadow-boxing since President Joe Biden threw in the towel as the Democratic’s candidate.

The gloves will be off in what is a critical test for both.

Harris, 59, has turbocharged and unified the Democratic party, and will now face an opponent who has called her “crazy” and subjected her to racist and sexist taunts.

America’s first female, Black and South Asian VP has overhauled Trump’s lead in the polls but insists she remains the “underdog” in a tight race.

Knowing what’s at stake, she is spending five days holed up in the nearby city of Pittsburgh preparing for the debate.

The 78-year-old Trump is meanwhile expected to opt for an aggressive approach after Harris’s entry into the race upended his White House bid and turned him into the oldest candidate in US history.

“These are two very different candidates that have previously never met in person. So, it will prove to be a very enlightening debate which could even be the make-it-or-break-it factor in the election,” Erin Christie, of the Rutgers University School of Communication and Information, told AFP.

That lack of any prior face time is a result of Trump having refused to attend Biden’s inauguration after falsely claiming he was cheated in the 2020 election.

Adding an extra frisson is the fact that the debate is happening in Pennsylvania, the most bitterly fought of the battleground states that will decide the election.

Tuesday’s debate could meanwhile be the last. Harris and Trump have not agreed to anymore, and this one is only happening after a bitter row ended with Harris’s camp reluctantly agreeing to have the candidates’ microphones muted while the other is speaking.

Americans will now be watching closely to see how it actually plays out on stage.

It is after all just over two months since Biden was forced to drop his bid for a second term after a disastrous debate against Trump sparked Democratic concerns about his age and mental fitness.

Biden himself will be watching on Tuesday, his spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre said on Friday. “The vice president is smart. She is someone that knows how to get the job done,” added Jean-Pierre, a former senior aide to Harris during her failed 2020 campaign

While few are predicting anything quite as dramatic from Tuesday’s encounter between Trump and Harris, it still has the potential to be a decisive moment in the final sprint to November 5.

And despite their differences, both will have the same goal — to reach out to a core of undecided voters in a deeply polarized America.

In the red corner, Harris will rely on her coolly cutting style and her history as a prosecutor, as she takes on a convicted felon who also faces charges of conspiring to overturn his 2020 election loss against Biden.

But she will still however have to battle sexist and racist stereotypes about “angry Black women,” said Rebecca Gill, a political science professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

While Harris will also face pressure to be less vague on policy, her campaign is expected to keep up the “do no harm” strategy that has seen Harris give just one televised interview since replacing Biden.

In the blue corner, Trump’s challenge will be to decide just how much Trump voters want.

Trump’s angry, rambling style fires up his right-wing base but it remains to be seen how it will play against a candidate vying to be America’s first Black woman president.

All eyes will be on ABC’s moderators too to see if they fact-check what will be a stream of falsehoods, if Trump’s six previous presidential debates are anything to go by.

“This debate may go down in the history books. Break out the popcorn,” said Andrew Koneschusky, a former press secretary for US Senate leader Chuck Schumer.

Click to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

CELEBRITY21 seconds ago

A jednak! Probierz ogłosił zmiany w powołaniach! Nagły zwrot

CELEBRITY12 mins ago

Znany trener wbił szpilę Abramowicz. “Bardzo trudny układ”

CELEBRITY56 mins ago

Kiedy debiut Wojciecha Szczęsnego? Hansi Flick zabrał głos

CELEBRITY1 hour ago

Piękne gole w meczu Realu, a na koniec dramat. Cały stadion słyszał krzyk gwiazdy

CELEBRITY1 hour ago

Koszmar nowożeńców w Krakowie. Po nocy poślubnej w hotelu dokonali szokującego odkrycia

CELEBRITY2 hours ago

Tomasz Wiktorowski, trener Igi Świątek, rozwiódł się z żoną z powodu……. read more details

CELEBRITY2 hours ago

Starsza pani poszła na grzyby i zniknęła. Szukały ją dziesiątki ludzi

CELEBRITY2 hours ago

Show Roberta Lewandowskiego. Hat-trick! Został bohaterem w 25 minut

CELEBRITY2 hours ago

5 października 67 urodziny obchodzi Roman Jankowski – były speedster, obecnie trener. Prawie całą karierę zawodową spędził w Związku Leszczyńskim (1976-2001). Z tym klubem zdobył pięć tytułów mistrza drużynowego. Dwukrotnie najlepszy okazał się wynik indywidualny. Brązowy medalista Drużynowych Mistrzostw Świata 1980. Uczestnik finałów indywidualnych mistrzostw świata 1987 i 1988.

CELEBRITY2 hours ago

Szokujące sceny na promie do Szwecji. Finał akcji

CELEBRITY2 hours ago

Rafał Trzaskowski tak się odstrzelił na Wielką Warszawską. Stylista: Spodnie wyraźnie nie pasują do reszty

CELEBRITY2 hours ago

Nagłe wieści: Smutek w społeczności tenisowej, zespół trenerski Igi Świątek oficjalnie potwierdzony martwy po…… read more details

Copyright © 2024 UKvarieti