President Joe Biden on Friday rejected participation in more debates, which former President Donald Trump said Biden agreed to attend.
NBC News and Telemundo would have hosted the first presidential event, NBC News confirmed, while Fox News at Virginia State University would have hosted a vice presidential debate at a historically black college.
Trump announced the now-defunct agreement Friday. “I have accepted a fourth Presidential Debate against Crooked Joe Biden, this time with NBC & Telemundo,” Trump said:
It is important as Republicans that we WIN with our Great Hispanic Community, who Biden has devastated with Crippling Inflation, High Gas Prices, Crime in our Streets, and Border Chaos. This Fourth Debate will go along with our previously accepted Presidential Debates on CNN, ABC, and Fox. This is all in addition to our accepting an invitation from Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum of Fox News to host the Vice Presidential Debate at Virginia State University, or another venue, in Virginia, to be named later. These are the Debates that Voters have been asking for, and these are the Debates that Voters will get!
Biden quickly rejected the debates.
“The debate about debates is over,” a Biden campaign official told NBC News. “No more games.”
Biden preferred CNN to host at least one presidential debate, he said Wednesday. The Biden campaign said the president would debate Trump only in June and September, without live audiences present. CNN’s Jake Tapper and Dana Bash will co-host the first event.
Trump accepted Biden’s invitation and urged the president to debate him earlier and more often.
“I’m ready to go…The dates that they proposed are fine…Let’s see if Joe can make it to the stand-up podium,” Trump reportedly told Fox News Digital. “The proposed June and early September dates are fully acceptable to me. I will provide my own transportation.”