From Reuters:
“Final
Trump-Biden debate will feature 'mute' button after chaotic first clash”
The final
debate between President Donald Trump and Democratic rival Joe Biden will
feature a mute button to allow each candidate to speak uninterrupted,
organizers said on Monday, looking to avoid the disruptions that marred the first
matchup. The Trump campaign voiced objections to the change - made after
the president repeatedly talked over both Biden and the moderator at last
month’s debate in violation of its agreed-upon rules - but said the Republican
would still take part in the Thursday night event, one of his last chances to
reach a large prime-time audience before voting ends on Nov. 3.
The
Presidential Commission on Debates said each candidate’s microphone at the
debate in Nashville, Tennessee, would be silenced to allow the other to make
two minutes of opening remarks at the beginning of each 15-minute segment of
the debate. Both microphones will be turned on to allow a back-and-forth after
that time. “President Trump is committed to debating Joe Biden regardless of
last-minute rule changes from the biased commission in their latest attempt to
provide advantage to their favored candidate,” campaign manager Bill Stepien
said. The Biden campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment. More
than 30 million Americans have already cast their ballots, limiting Trump’s
chances of reframing a contest that national and state opinion polls show him
trailing. Trump repeatedly interrupted Biden during a chaotic and ill-tempered
debate on Sept. 29, at one point provoking Biden to snap: “Will you shut up,
man?”
‘THEY CUT
YOU OFF’ Trump backed out of a second scheduled debate set for last
Thursday over a disagreement about the virtual format following his COVID-19
infection. At that time, he raised concerns about having his microphone muted.
“You sit behind a computer and do a debate - it’s ridiculous, and then they
cut you off whenever they want,” Trump said in an Oct. 8 interview on Fox
Business. Earlier on Monday, Trump’s campaign said it was unhappy with
the announced set of topics for Thursday’s debate, arguing that it should focus
more on foreign policy and asserting that the nonpartisan group was tilted
toward Biden. Biden’s campaign said both sides previously agreed to let
moderators choose the subjects. It said Trump wanted to avoid discussing his
stewardship of the coronavirus pandemic, which surveys show is the top issue
for voters. “As usual, the president is more concerned with the rules of
a debate than he is getting a nation in crisis the help it needs,” Biden
spokesman TJ Ducklo said.
The number of
Americans who voted early reached 30.2 million on Monday, according to the
University of Florida’s United States Elections Project. That number represents
more than one-fifth of all the votes cast in the 2016 election. Early voting is
likely to ramp up this week as more states open up voting centers for those who
want to avoid possible coronavirus exposure at crowded Election Day polling
sites. In Florida, where more than 2.5 million have already voted by mail,
residents lined up for the first day of early in-person voting. A Reuters/Ipsos
poll released last week showed Trump and Biden effectively tied in the state,
which is seen as a must-win for the president. Hundreds of people, most wearing
face masks, stood in pouring rain in the morning outside the public library in
Coral Gables, a majority-Hispanic city near Miami. Louis Perez, 57, an
insurance fraud investigator, said he was voting for Biden because of Trump’s
handling of the coronavirus pandemic. “He lied about it right from the
beginning,” Perez, who is not affiliated with a party, said of Trump. Registered
Republican Antonio Sanchez, an architect who arrived in the United States from
Communist Cuba, said he supported Trump because he “stands for freedom” and against
socialism. “My two daughters are doctors,” said Sanchez, 59. “I don’t think
this could have happened anyplace other than America.”
^ If only we
could mute the vast majority of Politicians in real life. ^
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.