Kamala Harris camped at a Pittsburgh hotel for five days preparing for the debate tonight in which she will face Donald Trump for the first time for the presidential duel. Inside the hotel, reports said, there were highly choreographed debate practice sessions including a stage, a replica TV lighting, and Philippe Reines acting as Donald Trump in mock debates.
There were last-minute changes to Kamala Harris’ strategy as she was preparing for an unmuted debate — for which she pushed the ABC News but failed.An unmuted debate is when the contestants can interrupt the other during their speech — objecting, fact-checking, counter-questioning etc. But this was the first time in the history of the presidential debate that microphones were muted at the CNN debate and the same would happen at tonight’s debate. Microphones will be unmuted only when the candidate is speaking.
Politico earlier reported that Kamala Harris originally planned to object and directly question Donald Trump. But as it was not granted, her advisers had to rewrite the playbook, Fox News claimed. Since Kamala Harris has remained a prosecutor, she is more into counter-questioning the opponent instead of giving her monologue. Her campaign officials claimed that she would be “handcuffed” by the muted mic debate.
“Vice President Harris, a former prosecutor, will be fundamentally disadvantaged by this format, which will serve to shield Donald Trump from direct exchanges with the Vice President. We suspect this is the primary reason for his campaign’s insistence on muted microphones,” Harris campaign wrote to the ABC News.
No fake Kamala Harris in Donald Trump’s preparation
According to an NYT report, Donald Trump’s preparations were more improv. They are not debate prep but known as policy time where he’s provided with the latest figures. And there is no fake Kamala Harris in his debate preparation; sometimes his aides sit opposite him and bat questions back and forth.
What Hillary Clinton said
Hillary Clinton debated Donald Trump for the 2016 election. Her advice is that Kamala Harris should not be baited but she should bait him. “When I said he was a Russian puppet, he just sputtered onstage. I think that’s an example of how you get out a fact about him that really unnerves him,” Hillary said.
What worries the Trump camp
The Trump camp is worried that he will turn up at the stage angry, failing to stop himself for showing his deep contempt for Harris. Trump has already made it clear that he considered Hillary Clinton better than Kamala Harris. That may reflect in his debate if he does not put a check on that. His advisers want a happy Trump on the debate stage and not a mean, bully Trump as that would only hurt him in the debate.