Republican Trump replied he was ready to ‘rumble’, after being challenged by the Democratic incumbent.
Joe Biden and Donald Trump agreed on Wednesday to hold presidential debates in June and September after the Democratic incumbent challenged his rival to “make my day” and the scandal-plagued Republican replied he was ready to “rumble”.
News channel CNN announced it will hold the first debate on June 27 in Atlanta, Georgia. Trump and Biden both said they had agreed on a second debate on the ABC network on September 10.
The agreement ends months of uncertainty over whether the candidates would debate at all, and sees both the Democrat and the Republican shunning the traditional commission that has run debates since 1988.
Biden, 81, set out his own terms including having no studio audience, seeking to avoid a repeat of the often chaotic debates with political showman Trump in the 2020 election.
Trump, 77, accepted the dates even as he set out a starkly different vision with a larger venue for “excitement purposes” while his campaign called for adding debates in July and August as well.
“Donald Trump lost two debates to me in 2020. Since then, he hasn’t shown up for a debate. Now he’s acting like he wants to debate me again. Well, make my day, pal,” Biden said in a video on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.
“I’ll even do it twice.”
Biden had also trolled Trump over his ongoing criminal hush money trial in New York, which features a midweek break, adding: “I hear you’re free on Wednesdays.
