EGN NEWS DESK
Donald Trump is laying the muse for a “rigged” debate on ABC News earlier than he squares off with Kamala Harris.
In interviews, fundraising appeals, rallies, and posts on social media, the previous president has repeatedly blasted the host community and accused its prime expertise of being biased in opposition to him. He’s even accused the community, with out proof, of offering the questions prematurely to the Harris marketing campaign.
“ABC is the worst community when it comes to equity,” Trump mentioned throughout a Fox News city corridor with Sean Hannity not too long ago. “They’re very nasty, and I feel lots of people are going to be watching to see how nasty and the way unfair they’re.”
“Do you assume ABC will give Kamala each query beforehand? We already know her liberal media cronies would do ANYTHING to maintain her from getting embarrassed the identical method Biden was!” Trump mentioned in a fundraising enchantment. “I’m coming into this at a drawback — taking up Crooked Kamala AND the Fake News — however with you in my ear, I’m NOT SCARED OF ANYTHING!”
Claiming he’s up in opposition to unfair odds and dealing the refs forward of a significant occasion is a routine technique from Trump — one he employed forward of his debate with President Joe Biden in June as effectively. And in latest days he has solely escalated his criticism and allegations in opposition to ABC, which is internet hosting one of the vital anticipated moments of the 2024 election on Tuesday.
Trump’s assaults on the community illustrate his general strategy to debates, which partially middle on elevating doubts in regards to the equity of the moderators and questioning whether or not his rivals are breaking the principles. By doing so, Trump seems to be making an attempt to decrease expectations for himself and stress debate organizers into treating him extra favorably. And it permits him to put the groundwork to divert blame within the occasion he performs poorly.
“This is an expectations recreation,” mentioned former White House press secretary Sean Spicer. “And it’s not simply your opponent, he has two opponents. He has Kamala Harris, after which he has the community and hosts themselves.”
ABC didn’t reply to a request for remark.
Tuesday’s debate, hosted by longtime ABC News World News Tonight anchor David Muir and ABC News Live anchor Linsey Davis at Philadelphia’s National Constitution Center, would be the first time Trump and Harris meet head to head.
However there have been questions on whether or not Trump — or Harris — would really comply with debate. Trump raised considerations in regards to the equity of the community, and the Harris marketing campaign repeatedly pushed again on a rule from the primary debate with Trump and Biden mandating the microphones be muted in between responses.
The Harris marketing campaign ultimately relented after ABC agreed to maintain each microphones on throughout any heated backwards and forwards, and can permit a gaggle of reporters referred to as a “press pool” shut sufficient to the talk stage to pay attention to remarks that go unheard by the microphones.
Trump informed Fox News on Wednesday evening he even requested for his marketing campaign to incorporate within the debate guidelines that not one of the questions can be leaked to any candidate prematurely. In 2016, it was revealed that then-interim DNC chair Donna Brazile gave Hillary Clinton’s marketing campaign a heads up about particular questions in the course of the March Democratic major debate.
And he has repeatedly introduced up the shut relationship between Harris and Disney Entertainment co-chairman Dana Walden, who’s a private good friend, and who has donated to DemocratsABC News has made clear Walden has no editorial enter.
Trump’s offensive is much like the one he used previous to the primary debate in June, which aired on CNN. Trump repeatedly railed in opposition to the community previous to the talk, calling moderator Jake Tapper “Fake Tapper” and saying CNN can be favorable towards Biden, his then-opponent. Yet within the months for the reason that debate, Trump has had sort phrases for Tapper and his co-moderator, Dana Bash, saying they had been honest. Trump’s aides have privately praised the community over its determination to not reality examine the candidates in the course of the debate.
At the identical time, Trump has a historical past of accusing his opponents of dishonest. Ahead of his debates with Biden in 2020 and 2024, Trump advised that Biden can be utilizing performance-enhancing medicine, one thing Biden mocked earlier than his in the end disastrous efficiency. He made the identical accusation in opposition to Hillary Clinton in 2016.
Trump has a historical past with Muir. The veteran anchor has interviewed Trump a number of occasions, together with in May 2020, a number of months following the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak within the U.S. Muir drew criticism in some corners for his efficiency, with some saying his questioning was too comfortable and that he didn’t press Trump on falsehoods he unfold, though the Poynter Institute known as the interview “robust however honest and never contentious
Trump can also be suing one of many prime anchors at ABC News, George Stephanopoulos, who he continuously mocks out on the marketing campaign path. The former president filed a lawsuit in Florida federal courtroom earlier this yr claiming that he was defamed by the well-known newscaster throughout a “This Week” interview with Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.). Stephanopolous mentioned that Trump had been discovered liable of raping author E. Jean Carroll, however a jury discovered Trump liable in a Manhattan civil case for sexually abusing and defaming Carroll. A jury didn’t discover him accountable for rape. However the judge who presided over Carroll’s civil go well with in opposition to Trump wrote that the jury did conclude Carroll was raped, however New York legislation has a way more slim definition of rape than what is known in “frequent fashionable parlance.”
This summer season, Trump additionally attacked star ABC News reporter Rachel Scott as “nasty” and “hostile” throughout a contentious interview on the National Association of Black Journalists conference in Chicago.
“Are you with ABC, as a result of I feel they’re a pretend information community, a horrible community. I feel it’s disgraceful that I got here right here in good spirit,” Trump mentioned in response to a query about why Black voters ought to belief him.
