Vice President Kamala Harris has agreed to rules for an upcoming televised debate with opponent Donald Trump, including allowing microphones to be muted when it’s the other party’s turn to speak.
Ms. Harris’s campaign had previously opposed the silent microphone rule, which was agreed to by her predecessor in the presidential campaign, Joe Biden. Analysts said Ms. Harris’ team believed the rule would benefit Trump.
But on Wednesday, both Harris and the Trump campaign agreed to rules for the ground debate set by ABC News.
The debate, scheduled for September 10 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, will be the first showdown between the two as presidential candidates.
Its rules are similar to those of the June debate between President Joe Biden and Trump hosted by CNN, where Biden’s poor performance prompted unanimous calls for him to withdraw from the Democratic nomination. .
Political observers said at the time that the microphone-muting rule used in that debate could have worked to Trump’s advantage because it limited his ability to interrupt Mr. Biden and speak off the cuff and helped him deliver a more measured performance.
In a letter to ABC on Wednesday, the Harris campaign said it still believed the format of the debate would “fundamentally disadvantage” it, saying it would “help protect Donald Trump from to communicate directly with the Vice President.”
But the campaign added that it was accepting the rules so that the debate could continue.
“We know that if we do not accept his preferred format, there is a risk that Donald Trump will skip the debate entirely, as he has previously threatened to do,” the statement read.
“We therefore accept the full set of rules proposed by the ABC, including microphone muting.”
The Trump campaign said in a statement that “Kamala Harris and the rest of her Biden campaign” are “thrilled” to have “accepted the rules that have been agreed upon.”
However, Trump himself has previously said he would accept an unmuted microphone.
On Wednesday, he attacked ABC in an interview with Fox News, questioning its polls and calling it “the least fair network.”
He said he agreed to participate in the debate only “because (Ms. Harris’s campaign) wouldn’t do any other network.”
The debate will be held at the Constitution Center in Philadelphia and will last 90 minutes. It will be hosted by ABC hosts David Muir and Linsey Davis.
Neither candidate will give opening statements, and they won’t be allowed to talk to campaign staff during commercial breaks.
As with the CNN debate, there will be no live audience in the venue.
