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In a freewheeling press conference at his Mar-a-Lago home, Donald Trump said he would participate in three debates with Kamala Harris, including one with ABC News that he’d previously been pushing back on attending.
The ABC News debate, scheduled for September 10, is the only one both campaigns appear to have officially agreed on. Trump said Thursday that he’d also do a Fox News debate and an NBC News debate — those are tentatively slated for September 4 and September 25.
“She hasn’t done an interview. She can’t do an interview, she’s barely competent, and she can’t do an interview. But I look forward to the debates, because I think we have to set the record straight,” Trump said.
A Harris campaign spokesperson did not immediately respond when asked if they’d agreed to all three debates.
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The former president took questions for over an hour, covering ground on everything from January 6 to abortion to the state of the race while sometimes going off on tangents in his answers.
Abortion: Trump declined to say how he’d vote in Florida’s upcoming ballot initiative aimed at expanding abortion access, adding that he’d hold a press conference “in the near future” with that particular announcement.
“I think that abortion has become much less of an issue, I think it’s actually going to be a very small issue,” Trump added.
January 6: Trump repeatedly boasted about the size of the crowds on January 6, 2021, when supporters he addressed who were in Washington to protest the certification of his election loss marched on the Capitol and rioted. More than 1,200 people have been charged in connection to the day’s events.
“Nobody’s spoken to crowds bigger than me. If you look at Martin Luther King, when he did his speech, his great speech, and you look at ours — same real estate, same everything, same number of people, if not we had more,” Trump said. “We actually had more people.”
Trump falsely asserted that “nobody was killed on January 6,” and that the people who have since been convicted were treated “unfairly.”
Looking ahead, Trump said there would be a “peaceful transfer of power” next year, but rejected the premise the previous election did not have one despite the deadly violence at the Capitol.
“Of course, there’ll be a peaceful transfer,” he said. “And there was last time, and there will be a peaceful transfer. I just hope we’re going to have honest elections.”
Kamala Harris: Trump attacked Harris as “not smart” and challenged her to do interviews and press conferences while accusing her of overseeing a surge in border crossings as part of the Biden administration. Harris has not taken questions from the media since President Biden dropped out of the race; Thursday’s Trump event, along with similar press events from JD Vance this week, have been held in part to highlight the contrast on access.
“The reason she’s not doing what I do and she’s not doing what she should be doing, she won’t even do interviews with friendly people, because she can’t do better than Biden,” he said.
Joe Biden: Trump, who has fixated publicly and reportedly in private on Biden’s exit from the race, said he was frustrated on Biden’s behalf with pressure from his party to drop out. He seemed to suggest, inaccurately, that there was a constitutional barrier to a party switching their nominee.
“The presidency was taken away from Joe Biden, and I’m no Biden fan, but I tell you what, from a constitutional standpoint, from any standpoint you look at, they took the presidency away,” he said.
Tim Walz: Trump referred to Walz as the “Minnesota gentleman” during the press conference, saying that “there’s certainly never been anybody so liberal like these two, or even close,” and inaccurately suggesting Walz supports abortion after a baby has been born, which is illegal in all states.
The comments reflected those made by others in his campaign as they seek to portray Walz as more left-wing than other options Harris could have tapped as her running mate. Trump’s own running mate, JD Vance, told Semafor in an interview Wednesday that Walz is “atrocious” on issues that Rust Belt voters care about, like immigration and protecting American manufacturing jobs. Vance also decried a Minnesota bill providing legal refuge for transgender youth fleeing state bans on gender-affirming care; Trump called Walz “heavy in the transgender world.”
The economy: “There are some of the most brilliant people on Wall Street that are saying that President Trump doesn’t win, you’re going to have a depression,” Trump said, a nod to the recent market turmoil amid fears of a US recession. “I have to agree.”
Trump suggested he would be able to steer the Federal Reserve effectively as someone with business acumen, pointing to his record in his first term when he claimed the US had “perfect” inflation.