PHOENIX (AP) — The nonpartisan Commission on Presidential Debates, which has planned presidential faceoffs in every election since 1988, has an uncertain future after President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump struck an agreement to meet on their own.
The Biden and Trump campaigns announced a deal Wednesday to meet for debates in June on CNN and September on ABC. Just a day earlier, Frank Fahrenkopf, chair of the Commission on Presidential Debates, had sounded optimistic that the candidates would eventually come around to accepting the commission’s debates.
“There’s no way you can force anyone to debate,” Fahrenkopf said in a virtual meeting of supporters of No Labels, which has continued as an advocacy group after it abandoned plans for a third-party presidential ticket. But he noted candidates have repeatedly toyed with skipping debates or finding alternatives before eventually showing up, though one was canceled in 2020 when Trump refused to appear virtually after he contracted COVID-19.
Devout Christian doctor, 68, who punched dementia
Beijing's Yanqing district ready for Labor Day travel rush
Travel fanatic who spent $530 for a ONE
Supreme Court rejects an appeal from a Canadian man once held at Guantanamo
FIS president hails China's skiing, snowboarding potential
TikTok users are sent into a frenzy over 'missing' conspiracy theorist
Bella Hadid goes braless in a thigh
2nd Hong Kong pop culture festival to open on April 6
Strictly star Giovanni Pernice's former partner Rose Ayling
Nadal confirms comeback at Barcelona Open