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Donald Trump has ruined plans for his second presidential debate with Democratic challenger Joe Biden after saying he will not participate in a virtual event.
The president’s statement came less than an hour after organizers announced that the debate would take place virtually.
The Commission on Presidential Debates said the decision was made to “protect the health and safety of all those involved,” with the positive of the president coronavirus the test came just days after the first debate last week.
The commission said both candidates would appear in the second television debate, scheduled for next Thursday, from separate locations.
But, in an interview shortly after the announcement was made, Trump said, “I’m not going to do a virtual debate.”
He told Fox News that the arrangement “is not acceptable to us.”
Biden’s camp had said their candidate would participate, and the former vice president said he hopes to “speak directly to the American people and compare his plan to unite the country and rebuild better with the failed leadership of Donald Trump.”
In a sign of the Trump campaign’s opposition to the deal, the president’s son, Eric Trump, had claimed that “Biden’s mouth is watering at the idea of a virtual debate.”
“It will have 12 teleprompters and 14 campaign employees holding flash cards to the other side of the camera!” He added on Twitter.
The president returned to the Oval Office of the White House on Wednesday, even though he is still recovering from COVID-19.
His doctors said Trump had had no symptoms of coronavirus in the past 24 hours.
In his interview with Fox News on Thursday, the president said: “I think I’m better to the point that I feel better than I did – I joked – 20 years ago.
“I feel perfect, nothing happens.
“I had a case, they knocked him out, I think Regeneron was responsible.”
Trump has promised that the experimental antibody treatment Regeneron, which he received while in a military hospital, would be offered to Americans for free.
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