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United States President Donald Trump and Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden participate in their first 2020 presidential campaign debate held on the Cleveland Clinic campus at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, United States, on September 29, 2020.
Image Credit: Reuters
The commission that runs the presidential debates said it would change the formats of upcoming presidential debates after Tuesday’s chaotic showdown between President Donald Trump and Democratic candidate Joe Biden to provide a more orderly exchange of views.
“Last night’s debate made it clear that additional structure must be added to the format of the remaining debates to ensure a more orderly discussion of the issues,” the commission said in a statement.
The commission has not yet said what changes it would make, but Fox News moderator Chris Wallace struggled to maintain control of the discussion and enforce the time limits for responses that both campaigns had agreed to. Tuesday’s debate had a traditional format with a moderator and the two candidates at lecterns.
The debate committee is not partisan. The discussion formats are developed after weeks of negotiations between both campaigns and the commission, from the duration of responses, the time to respond to challenges and even the breaks, a fact that Wallace reminded Trump on Tuesday night. when he strayed from the rules.
The next debate, scheduled for October 15 in Miami, will have a city hall format, which is often less structured.
Trump carried his confrontational style to the first showdown Tuesday night, prompting numerous blunt and angry responses on both sides. Wallace had to yell at the nominees multiple times to keep the debate going as planned.
Biden told reporters during a train tour of Pennsylvania that he hoped any new structure would allow candidates to answer questions more fully.
“I just hope there is a way that the debating committee can control our ability to answer the question without interruption,” he said. Biden would not “speculate” on what the rule changes would be, but suggested that the candidates could not talk about each other.
“Literally, let’s say, Trump is asked the question, he has two minutes to answer the question. It has a microphone and no one else has a microphone. That’s what made some sense to me, ”Biden said.
The Trump campaign dismissed the need for changes, saying they would only be in response to what it called Biden’s poor performance.
“They’re only doing this because their man was hit last night. President Trump was the dominant force and now Joe Biden is trying to work with the umpires. They shouldn’t move the goal posts and change the rules in the middle of the game, “said communications director Tim Murtaugh.
