The first of three presidential debates between President Donald Trump and Democratic nominee Joe Biden will take place on Tuesday, September 29, at the Health Education Campus in Cleveland, Ohio. The event — originally scheduled to be at the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana — will now be co-hosted by Case Western Reserve University and Cleveland Clinic, according to the Commission on Presidential Debates.
When is the debate?
The debate will run from 9 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. ET without commercial breaks.
How to watch the debate
The debate can be viewed on CNN, Fox News, CBS, ABC, C-SPAN, NBC and MSNBC.
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Who is moderating the debate?
Chris Wallace, an anchor on Fox News Sunday, will be moderating the first presidential debate.
What are the debate topics?
The debate will be divided into six 15-minute segments, each focused on a major topic.
Wallace selected the following as the topics he will cover:
- Trump and Biden’s records
- The Supreme Court
- Covid-19
- The economy
- Race and violence in our cities
- The integrity of the election
Wallace will open each segment with a question and then Trump and Biden will each have two minutes to respond. Then, the candidates will have the opportunity to respond to each other. The moderator will use the rest of the time to prompt deeper discussion, according to the commission.
On Sunday, September 27, The New York Times published a deep-dive investigation into Trump’s tax records extending more than two decades. The documents “portray a businessman who takes in hundreds of millions of dollars a year yet racks up chronic losses that he aggressively employs to avoid paying taxes,” the outlet reported.
On the same day, Trump denied the story and questioned Biden’s health and former debate performances.
“I will be strongly demanding a Drug Test of Sleepy Joe Biden prior to, or after, the Debate on Tuesday night,” Trump said on Twitter. “Naturally, I will agree to take one also. His Debate performances have been record setting UNEVEN, to put it mildly. Only drugs could have caused this discrepancy???”
When asked to respond at a news conference, Biden laughed and said he had no comment.
Trump made similar demands to Hillary Clinton in 2016 when he suggested she was aided by performance-enhancing drugs during a presidential debate. He regularly questioned if Clinton had the health, stamina and energy needed to be president.
When are the next debates?
The vice presidential debate will take place at The University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah, on Wednesday, October 7. The second presidential debate will be on Thursday, October 15 at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts in Miami, Florida. The final presidential debate will be on Thursday, October 22 at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee.
