The first Biden-Trump debate of 2024 brings new fights between old rivals

WASHINGTON — Four years ago, Joe Biden rehearsed for debates at a lectern in the basement of his Delaware home. Now, as president, he can choose a room in the White House, his retreat at Camp David, Maryland, or almost anywhere else in the country.

But no matter how much the atmosphere around Biden has changed – whether it’s the room he’s in, the ups and downs of the economy or the outbreak of wars in Eastern Europe and the Middle East – his preparations for revenge debates with his former -President Donald Trump pledge to be remarkably consistent with his 2020 sessions.

Trump is reluctant to practice for debates — much less engage in the full-blown simulations familiar to most presidential candidates — according to three people close to him.

“What is that?” a Trump aide responded with dry humor when asked about Trump’s preparedness plans.

And yet, on June 27th – the first time that two men who occupied the Oval Office will meet in a televised presidential debate – they will have four years of new material to discuss. Trump’s main message is that he is strong and Biden is weak. Biden’s is that he cares about Americans, while Trump only cares about himself.

Trump’s advisers say he doesn’t need formal rehearsals because he spends so much time interacting with voters and the media — at rallies like the one he held in New York’s Bronx last week, at pop-ins at local restaurants, in one-on-one interviews and in near-daily news conferences at the Manhattan courthouse where he is on trial.

Biden’s “puppet masters” are in a complete panic trying to figure out how to support their weak candidate, Trump spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said in a statement. “In contrast, President Trump is giving 90-minute speeches to tens of thousands of supporters and giving difficult interview after difficult interview, talking about how we are going to bring back Trump’s great economy and once again secure our borders. ”

Both candidates run the risk of debating themselves – or even their backgrounds – when persuasive voters will be paying attention to learn about their plans for the future. This is a particularly grave danger for Trump, who rarely misses an opportunity to falsely claim that he won the last election.

“One of the questions here for him is how much is he talking about 2017 to 2020, his own record, how much is he talking about Joe Biden [and] How forward-looking is he talking about his second term?” said a person familiar with his past debate prep sessions. “Time will tell if he is very progressive. I would definitely recommend it.”

Biden’s advisers say his campaign will lay the groundwork for the first debate through paid ads, media coverage and grassroots communications aimed at highlighting Trump’s nomination of Supreme Court justices who voted to strike down abortion protections, his adoption of election conspiracy theories and his efforts to overturn his 2020 defeat, as well as what they say is an economic agenda that would “make his rich friends richer and increase costs for the middle class.”

“In the month leading up to the first debate, the Biden-Harris campaign will focus on Trump’s dangerous campaign promises and unhinged rhetoric,” Biden campaign chair Jen O’Malley Dillon wrote in a memo last week. “We will ensure that the voters who will decide this election are reminded of the chaos and damage Trump caused as president – ​​and why they kicked him out four years ago.”

Comparing their presidencies is a lens through which one can expect them to filter battles over the economy, abortion rights, the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, the wars in Ukraine and Gaza, the federal response to the Covid-19 pandemic. and the future of American governance. .

The White House and Biden’s campaign have not yet finalized the list of participants in preparation for the debate. But Ron Klain, Biden’s former White House chief of staff who keeps a file on every question asked in past presidential debates, will reprise the role he played as prep guru for several Democratic presidential candidates.

A source close to Biden said the list of attendees will likely include White House aides Anita Dunn, Mike Donilon, Steve Ricchetti and Bruce Reed; O’Malley Dillon; and campaign co-chair Cedric Richmond. This source also mentioned author Jon Meacham and Michael Sheehan, who coaches Democratic candidates in the public speaking style, as possible prep helpers.

It remains unclear whether Biden’s lawyer, Bob Bauer, who played Trump in the 2020 drills, will do so again.

Klain and Dunn declined to comment for this article, citing their desire to keep the entire effort private.

“Let’s not argue,” Dunn said via text message.

To the extent that Trump may be cornered into modified preparatory sessions, they are likely to be very informal discussions on issues and tactics.

“Conventional preparations are not something he thinks he needs to do,” said the person familiar with previous debate sessions. “Part of it is him wanting to save his best performance for performance. Part of it is him thinking, ‘I’ve got this covered.’

In his first debate in 2020, Trump received criticism – even from ssome Republican colleagues — for repeatedly interrupting Biden and Fox News moderator Chris Wallace. Biden prepared a kind of trap by intervening in the opening minutes of the debate, which seemed to irritate Trump and encourage him to become hyper-aggressive.

When Biden pressed him to disown the Proud Boys, a white supremacist group, Trump told them to “step back and stand still” in the final stretch to the election. He strangely accused Biden of wanting to get rid of the cows.

In the second and final debate in Nashville, Tennessee, in October of that year, Trump’s demeanor was more traditional and the two men fought more on substance than style.

Trump’s inner circle still includes some of the people who helped him focus on the 2020 debates. For example, communications strategist Jason Miller is a senior adviser to his campaign, and Stephen Miller, a top policy adviser in the White House of Trump, remains close to him. But two of Trump’s three senior advisers, Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita, were not in top positions last time.

Outside the crowd preparing the debate are then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows; former New Jersey governor Chris Christie; Bill Stepien, who was Trump’s 2020 campaign manager; and Hope Hicks, a longtime Trump aide who is not working on the campaign.

It is unclear to what extent the debates affect the results of presidential elections that involve billions of dollars in advertising by campaigns and their allies. But opportunities are rare for voters to see candidates side by side, countering each other’s arguments on issues and character.

Trump and Biden have agreed to face each other a second time, on September 10, a schedule proposed by Biden that leaves two and a half months between meetings.