Biden Responds With Three Words When Asked If He’ll Debate Trump
Biden Tells Reporters To ‘Set It Up’ When Asked If He’ll Debate Trump
On Thursday afternoon, President Joe Biden offered a three-word response after being asked when he would debate former President Donald Trump ahead of the 2024 election.
“Set it up,” Biden said after a ceremony celebrating the WNBA’s Las Vegas Aces, who won the WNBA’s national championship in 2023.
The statement came following several months of Trump calling on Biden to debate him, saying he would do so “anywhere, anytime, anyplace.”
In April, Biden said he would be “happy” to debate Trump, telling broadcaster Howard Stern during an interview “I am, somewhere. I don’t know when…I’m happy to debate him.”
Trump has called on Biden to debate him in a variety of locales. In one Truth Social post, he called on Biden to debate him at a courthouse in Lower Manhattan.
“In the alternative, he’s in New York City today, although probably doesn’t know it, and so am I, stuck in one of the many Court cases that he instigated as ELECTION INTERFERENCE AGAINST A POLITICAL OPPONENT – A CONTINUING WITCH HUNT!” Trump posted to Truth Social. “It’s the only way he thinks he can win. In fact, let’s do the Debate at the Courthouse tonight – on National Television, I’ll wait around!”
Trump later suggested that the two debate at the White House, saying the venue would be “comfortable” for both of them.
“We’ll do it at the White House,” Trump said. “That would be very comfortable, actually. You tell me where. We’re ready.”
“We’re ready, willing and able. We don’t see him and I don’t think he’ll be here. Maybe next week he’ll do it,” Trump told reporters outside of the Manhattan Criminal Court. “I doubt it, but maybe next week.”
Biden has refused to commit to a debate with Trump, saying that any debate between the two “depends on his behavior.”
This comes four years after Biden’s much-maligned appearances in the debates ahead of the 2020 elections. The debates had additional levels of security due to COVID-19, and Biden’s performance during the first debate led many Democrats, including former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, to call on him to cancel the remaining debates with Trump.
This came as Biden was accused of campaigning from his basement, as he made almost no public appearances ahead of the 2020 election.
“The public discussion of cancelling the debate schedule should not be allowed to continue unchecked,” Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani wrote in a letter prior to the first debate.
“Written assurance of Joe Biden’s attendance at debates is important because we have seen this act before,” he continued, citing “numerous instances of Biden saying one thing about a given topic in public, only to have his campaign come behind him and clean up his statements after the fact.”
“While he may verbally give vague assertions of his intentions, there is no way of knowing what his handlers truly have planned for him,” Giuliani continued. “Presidential debates are too vital to the dissemination of information to voters to leave their very existence subject to the whims of political consultants pulling Joe Biden’s strings.”