When will the next presidential debate of 2024 take place and who will moderate it?
Update: Plans for the debate are in question after President Biden dropped out of the race. This story will be updated when new plans are confirmed.
Before President Biden decided to drop out of the race for reelection, he and former President Donald Trump had agreed to one more showdown on the debate stage before the 2024 presidential election.
The debate was planned for September, after both parties hold their national conventions. Their first debate, hosted June 27 by CNN in Atlanta, came unusually early in the election season given that neither candidate had formally received their party's nomination yet.
When is the second presidential debate?
ABC News originally planned to host the second debate between President Biden and Donald Trump on Tuesday, Sept. 10, at 9 p.m. Eastern Time.
But it is unclear whether the same schedule will be maintained now that Vice President Kamala Harris is on track to become the Democratic nominee instead of Mr. Biden.
Trump posted on social media on July 21 that he wanted it to be held on Fox News instead.
"I want to do a debate," Trump said an interview with Fox News host Laura Ingraham on July 29. Then he added, "If you're going to have a debate, you gotta do it I think before the votes are cast. I think it's very important that you do that. So the answer is yes, but I can also make a case for not doing it."
Who will moderate the next debate?
"World News Tonight" anchor David Muir and ABC News Live Prime anchor Linsey Davis were announced as moderators for the ABC debate.
The qualifications are similar to the first debate, making it unlikely that any non-major party candidates will meet the ballot access and polling requirements to earn a spot on stage. Candidates need to earn at least 15% support in four approved national polls and be on the ballot in enough states to be able to win 270 votes in the Electoral College — the threshold to win the presidency — in order to qualify.
How many more debates will there be for 2024?
There are no other presidential debates scheduled before the election. The Biden and Trump campaigns agreed to only two debates — one hosted by CNN and the other by ABC News.
They bypassed the tradition of three debates organized by the nonpartisan Commission on Presidential Debates, which had overseen presidential debates since 1988. The commission's three debates were scheduled to take place in September and October at universities in Texas, Virginia and Utah. Instead, this year's debates were agreed upon without any involvement by the commission.
The commission met with sharp criticism by both Trump — who has accused the commission of being biased against Republicans — and by close advisers to Mr. Biden, who view commission procedures as outmoded and fussy. The co-chair of the commission, Frank Fahrenkopf, told CBS News' podcast "The Takeout" that top White House communications adviser Anita Dunn "doesn't like us," and he said on a Politico podcast that this was the reason Mr. Biden's team went around the commission to negotiate directly with Trump's campaign.
CBS News invited both campaigns to participate in a vice presidential debate.
