US elections live: Kamala Harris heads to Pittsburgh to prepare for high-stakes debate against Donald Trump
From
Good morning US politics readers. Kamala Harris will travel today to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where she will prepare for next week’s presidential debate with Donald Trump. Trump, meanwhile, is set to deliver remarks at the Economic Club of New York and later appear remotely before a gathering in Las Vegas of the Republican Jewish Coalition.
On Wednesday, ABC News announced that both Harris and Trump had accepted the rules for the 10 September debate, drawing an end to a dispute between the two campaigns over the debate guidelines, including over whether microphones should be shut off when it was not a candidate’s turn to speak.
Here’s what else we’re watching:
A federal judge will hear arguments today to consider how to proceed with special counsel Jack Smith’s election subversion case against Donald Trump, in the first hearing since the supreme court’s immunity ruling.
Joe Biden will travel to Westby, Wisconsin, to deliver remarks on his economic agenda.
Jury selection is set to begin in Los Angeles for Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, in his federal tax trial, his second trial of the year after he was convicted on felony gun charges in June.
Donald Trump lobbed his usual insults and accusations at Kamala Harris and Tim Walz during a town hall aired on Fox News and then falsely claimed that immigrants from around the world were pouring into the US.
In the pre-taped interview that aired on Wednesday evening, the former president walked onto the stage in a Pennsylvania arena to cheers, applause and chants of “USA” from his supporters.
The town hall, hosted by Sean Hannity, comes less than a week before Trump and Kamala Harris meet on the debate stage and as both presidential candidates’ campaigns have drilled down on the US’s six so-called battleground states: Nevada, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin and Arizona. The election forecaster Nate Silver predicted that Pennsylvania is likely to be the “tipping point” for the election.
Donald Trump and Sean Hannity in a town hall moderated by the Fox News broadcaster in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Photograph: Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images
Donald Trump, in characteristically capricious style, had threatened to pull out of the 10 September debate, claiming he would not be given a fair opportunity.
Last week, he posted on his Truth Social network that ABC News was “fake news” and attacked its “so-called Panel of Trump Haters” after seeing the Republican senator Tom Cotton interviewed by Jonathan Karl on ABC’s This Week.
On Wednesday, Trump attended a town hall event moderated by Fox News host Sean Hannity, during which he took the chance to ridicule ABC News, which is hosting the debate.
“ABC is the worst network in terms of fairness,” Trump said.
They are the most dishonest network. The meanest, the nastiest, but that is what I was presented with. I was presented with ABC … I think a lot of people are going to be watching to see how nasty they are, how unfair they are. I agreed to do it because they wouldn’t do any other network.
Kamala Harris and Donald Trump have accepted the rules for the presidential debate in Philadelphia, due to air on ABC next week, the network said on Wednesday – including muted mics when the other candidate is speaking.
ABC News said in a release that Harris and Trump “have qualified for the debate under the established criteria, and both have accepted the following debate rules”.
The Trump and Harris campaigns had been in dispute over the debate guidelines, including over whether microphones should be shut off when it was not a candidate’s turn to speak. The Harris campaign had previously pushed for live, or “hot”, microphones, arguing that it would “fully allow for substantive exchanges between the candidates”. Trump’s campaign, meanwhile, had been pressing for them to be turned off.
The statement released by ABC made it clear that candidates’ microphones would be live only for the candidate whose turn it is to speak – and muted when the time belongs to another candidate.
It also said the debate would last 90 minutes and have two commercial breaks, and would be administered by two seated moderators, the ABC anchors David Muir and Linsey Davis, who would be the only people asking questions. There will be no audience in the room.
Good morning US politics readers. Kamala Harris will travel today to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where she will prepare for next week’s presidential debate with Donald Trump. Trump, meanwhile, is set to deliver remarks at the Economic Club of New York and later appear remotely before a gathering in Las Vegas of the Republican Jewish Coalition.
On Wednesday, ABC News announced that both Harris and Trump had accepted the rules for the 10 September debate, drawing an end to a dispute between the two campaigns over the debate guidelines, including over whether microphones should be shut off when it was not a candidate’s turn to speak.
Here’s what else we’re watching:
A federal judge will hear arguments today to consider how to proceed with special counsel Jack Smith’s election subversion case against Donald Trump, in the first hearing since the supreme court’s immunity ruling.
Joe Biden will travel to Westby, Wisconsin, to deliver remarks on his economic agenda.
Jury selection is set to begin in Los Angeles for Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, in his federal tax trial, his second trial of the year after he was convicted on felony gun charges in June.
