Former President Donald Trump during a campaign rally at the Santander Arena in Reading, Pa., Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024. His Fox News town hall, with an all-female audience, will be taped next Tuesday and aired the following day. (Doug Mills/The New York Times)
- Trump declined Fox News' invitation to debate Vice President Harris but will attend a taped town hall with an all-female audience.
- Harris will participate in a live town hall on CNN on October 23, engaging with voters in Pennsylvania.
- Trump’s campaign formally declined to debate Harris, while Harris' team has not yet commented on the Fox invitation.
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Former President Donald Trump turned down Fox News’ invitation to debate Vice President Kamala Harris on the air this month.
But the Republican nominee will appear on the network next week for an unusual televised town hall, fielding questions from an all-female audience.
The event, announced by Fox News on Friday, will focus on “issues impacting women ahead of the election,” the network said, including abortion, day care, child care, health care and the economy.
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Taped Event in Georgia
It will not be shown live. The event will be taped Tuesday evening, in Cumming, Georgia, and air Wednesday at 11 a.m. The moderator is Fox host Harris Faulkner.
Trump’s Democratic opponent, Harris, is set to appear for her own town hall on CNN on Oct. 23, with voters in Pennsylvania. That event will be aired live.
CNN has said that Trump has an open invitation to appear on the network for a town hall. Fox News on Friday said the same about Harris.
Trump, whose performance at the ABC debate in September was widely viewed as lackluster, has repeatedly signaled that he has no intention of meeting Harris again on the debate stage before Election Day.
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Chris LaCivita, one of Trump’s campaign managers, formally declined Fox News’ invitation for a debate in Pennsylvania Oct. 23 or 27 several hours after the network first proposed it, according to a person familiar with the exchange. Harris’ campaign has not commented on the Fox invitation to debate, with anchors Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum moderating.
If Harris accepted the Fox News invitation, it could allow her to sharpen her argument that Trump is afraid to joust with her face to face — even on a channel where he enjoys sympathetic coverage from commentators.
Agreeing to a Fox debate, though, could increase pressure on Harris to appear on Fox for her own solo town hall, which her campaign so far has been reluctant to do.
In an interview set to air next week, Harris’ husband, Doug Emhoff, told MSNBC host Joe Scarborough that he believed Trump was afraid to debate the vice president.
“You saw the first debate, didn’t you? Yeah, that’s why,” Emhoff said when Scarborough asked what was stopping Trump, according to an advance excerpt. “He’s afraid that that’s going to happen again.”
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This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
By Michael M. Grynbaum/Doug Mills
c. 2024 The New York Times Company
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