Trump and his followers want to blow up presidential debates

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Of all the political rituals, few are as tiring and dizzying as debate over debates.

At election time, a candidate and his or her proxies will go round and round on opposite sides, fight, jockey and fight over how and when the political opponent will party on a stage and answer questions that aim to distract participants from their routine.

It can take several months, in a truly miserable form of Kabuki theater.

Fortunately, over the past few decades the country has survived a futile bust in contests for the White House. Since 1987, the Commission on Presidential Debates, jointly established by the leaders of the two main parties, has carefully overseen the process, presenting candidates with a take-it-or-leave-it invitation to appear in what has always been the campaign’s largest TV audience-a viewer that reaches tens of millions.

Now former President Trump and his factotums in the Republican National Committee are trying to blow things up, because the apparent collapse of the nation’s foundation of free and fair elections has not done enough damage to our stuttering political system.

Oh, and because the commission muted candidates ’microphones in parts of the second debate in 2020 after Trump ignored rules about speaking out about Joe Biden and acting like a 12-year-old at speed.

In a letter sent to the commission last week, RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel said the committee was preparing to change its rules to ask candidates requesting the GOP presidential nomination to commit not to participate in the any debates sponsored by the commission, beginning in 2024.

“Our sincere hope is that [commission’s] The repeated missteps and the partisan action of its board members made it clear that the organization no longer provided a fair and impartial forum for presidential debates required by law and worthy of American citizens, “McDaniel wrote, demonstrating Trumpian’s absolute ability to take the authoritative sound. but absurd and highly amusing statements out of thin air.

Although debates have become an institutional part of modern presidential campaigns, that has not always happened.

There were no debates in some elections following the 1960 presidential contest, when Richard M. Nixon famously sweated his way in a gruesome show against John F. Kennedy. The main participants in the White House faced off in 1976, 1980 and 1984, but those sessions were held on a whim, and subject to the gamemanship, of the candidates and their strategists.

When the commission-an independent, nonprofit entity with a two-party board of directors-had control the debates became a reliable and most anticipated feature of presidential campaigns, and vice presidents. (Free-for-all held during the main season are primarily broadcast by cable television networks, with definitely mixed results.)

Over time, there have been changes in the format of the debate. The commission experimented with the number of moderators and journalists asking questions. Introduced town hall sessions. The entire segments focus on a particular topic, to draw a deeper discussion.

Frank Fahrenkopf, the commission’s co-chairman and a former head of the Republican National Committee, said the commissioners remain open to further changes.

“We sat down and talked to everyone,” he said in an interview from his condominium in Palm Beach, Fla. “That’s what we always do in four years in between [campaigns], we try to say, ‘How can we make it better?’ So we listen to people’s suggestions. ”

One proposal sought by the RNC-to move forward with the first scheduled debate, to consider early voting-is entirely reasonable.

But other requests, including “a code of conduct” for debate moderators, seem more aimed at alleviating Trump’s fragile ego than addressing any real problem. Similar to legislative efforts to eradicate phantom voter fraud, or address “nigged” elections in 2020.

Fahrenkopf scoffed at claims that the commission was biased against the GOP. “I’ve been a Republican all along,” he said, citing his long history of helping party leadership in Nevada before he was chosen by President Reagan to lead the RNC for four years in the mid -1980s.

That said, Fahrenkopf continued, commissioners strive to put aside their partisanship and political beliefs and, although it may sound, do what is best for the country.

The evidence suggests that it works.

Some moderators performed better than others. Some debates are more, or less, informative. Each side saw reasons to complain about the policies, or whoever grilled the candidates. (Usually after one or the other gets bad reviews.)

Democrats claim that moderator Jim Lehrer allowed 2012 Republican nominee, Mitt Romney, to run for President Obama. Trump complained about moderators in 2016 and again in 2020, and skipped a debate in 2020 after contracting COVID-19 and refusing to take part in a distant session.

Romney turned out to be McDaniel’s uncle. (She apparently removed her maiden name to appease Trump, who despises the Utah senator, in one of the GOP’s more tragic acts of self-abasement.)

Romney said it would be “crazy” for the Republican Party to snatch its candidates from the fall showcase.

“Americans want to see candidates for president debating issues of consequence to them,” the senator told media outlet Insider, “and it provides a service to the country and to the people to hear prospective candidate of the two main parties duke. out. “

This is a time where the uncle knows best. McDaniel and the others who surrendered to Trump should be careful.

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