Former President Donald Trump on Saturday turned down Kamala Harris’s request for a second debate, this time with CNN, saying it’s “too late” because early voting has already begun.
Harris had announced Saturday that she accepted an invitation by CNN to debate Trump on Oct. 23.
I will gladly accept a second presidential debate on October 23.
— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) September 21, 2024
I hope @realDonaldTrump will join me. https://t.co/Trb8HUBsDh
Trump claimed during a rally in Wilmington, N.C., that Harris and CNN cooked up another debate proposal because she’s “losing badly” in the polls.
“Just announced a little while ago as I was just coming off the plane, they would like to do another debate,” Trump said, prompting boos from the crowd. “Although good entertainment value…I’ve already done two, one with Crooked Joe Biden at CNN, and the other one with Kamala on ABC.”
Trump brings up Kamala Harris accepting CNN's invitation for a debate but says "it's just too late." Doesn't sound like he wants to do it. pic.twitter.com/p4yBDlQkgC
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) September 21, 2024
Trump explained that CNN wants to course-correct its reputation among the left because of its perceived fairness of Trump during his June debate against Joe Biden.
“CNN was very fair I thought. Joe was driven out of the race — it was a coup, by the way — and they’ve been widely criticized by the radical left lunatics for all of the fairness. They were very fair. In other words, they won’t be fair again because they took a lot of abuse from the radical left.”
The former president went on to mock the Harris campaign for trying to gin up another debate after polls have shown the last debate failed to move the needle for Kamala in swing states.
“The problem with another debate is that it’s just too late. Voting has already started. She’s had her chance to do it with Fox,” Trump said. “You know, Fox invited us on and I waited and waited and they turned it down. But now she wants to do a debate right before the election with CNN because she’s losing badly.”
“It’s like a fighter. She sees the polls, she sees what’s happening. She’s losing badly. But it’s like a fighter who goes into the ring and gets knocked out, the first thing he says is, ‘I want a rematch!'” he added.