Kamala refuses to debate Trump on Fox News—Trump will hold a town hall instead

Kamala Harris has officially refused to debate President Donald Trump on Fox News after the network offered a date of September 4. Harris, who has taken Joe Biden's place at the top of the Democrat ticket, also feels entitled to any and all prior arrangments the Biden campaign made with Trump. As such, she has only agreed to one scheduled debate, which will air on ABC on September 10. Trump has proposed two others, but Harris' media-shy campaign has refused to commit to anything. She hasn't held a press conference, she hasn't sat for an interview, and increasingly this appears to be all by design.

"Comrade Kamala Harris has just informed us that she will NOT do the FoxNews Debate on September 4th," Trump said on Truth Social. "I am not surprised by this development because I feel that she knows it is very difficult, at best, for her to defend her record setting Flip-Flopping on absolutely everything she once believed in, including her statements that THERE WILL BE NO FRACKING IN PENNSYLVANIA and her HORRIBLE Performance on the Border, our 'Border Czar,' where millions of criminals and people from mental institutions and terrorists, have been allowed to pour into our Country, totally unchecked and unvetted. It’s called, and she LOVES IT, an OPEN BORDER!!! Rather than the debate on September 4th, I have agreed to do a Tele-Town Hall, anchored by Sean Hannity, for Fox. It will take place in the Great Commonwealth of Pennsylvania - Details to follow!"
Former Hawaii Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard has been working with Trump on debate prep. It was her questioning of Harris on the debate stage in 2020 that essentially knocked Harris out of contention for her party's nomination that year, along with her miserable poll numbers and lack of public support.

Gabbard said that Harris has an "incredibly vulnerable record" and that this will be front and center when Trump takes the podium opposite her on the debate stage. Trump, she said, has proven "time and time again" that he has a "strong performance on the debate stage." Trump "doesn’t really need help at all with debate prep, nor does he do debate prep like a typical politician would, because he’s not a politician," Gabbard said.

Pete Buttigieg told The New York Times that he did not think Harris should debate on Fox, claiming the network was biased. "Do you think the Vice President should go on Fox? Do you think she should debate on Fox?" The Daily host asked Buttigieg, a Kamala campaign surrogate. "I would be skeptical of the fairness of a debate hosted by Fox," Buttigieg said, "but that's a decision that I'm sure she and the campaign will think through," he replied.

In the weeks since Harris became her party's nominee, it has become clear that many on her team, from allies to advisors, do not want her to sit for media interviews or stand for press conferences. CNN noted that Harris is "historically vulnerable" when she has to speak off-the-cuff. She tends to repeat herself and use excessive amounts of words without actually saying anything substantive. In one instance, when talking about the war in Ukraine, she said "Ukraine is a country in Europe. It exists next to another country called Russia. Russia is a bigger country. Russia is a powerful country. Russia decided to invade a smaller country called Ukraine. So basically that’s wrong."

Repeatedly, she has spoken about the "duality" of democracy, saying "we think about the strength of our democracy, you know I think there's a duality to the nature of democracy, when it's intact, oh it's so strong in terms of what it does to uphold and protect individual rights and freedoms, so strong in its nature, and very fragile, it will only be as strong as our willingness to fight for it."

And of course, her catchphrase about being able "to see what can be, unburdened by what might have been," has been endlessly mocked. The DNC this week in Chicago mirrors those sentiments with continuous comments about moving "forward into the future," as if there's some other direction in which time moves.