There’s One Very Good Reason Why Kamala Harris Should Agree to Fox News Debate With Trump
Vice President Kamala Harris immediately rebuffed the idea of participating in a Fox News debate put forth by former President Donald Trump. But there is one very good reason she should agree to go on that largely right-of-center network: to force debate moderators to fact-check Trump’s election denialism.
Late Friday night, Trump tried to gazump ABC News, the presumptive Democratic Nominee, and, yes, even Fox News, by claiming he’d “agreed with” Fox News on a Sept 4th debate.
What followed was a series of political recriminations about “who” exactly backed out of “what,” seeing as Trump was bailing on a previously agreed debate with President Joe Biden on ABC News, even though the debate did not stipulate anyone by name, just candidates who had earned the nomination.
The Harris campaign quickly responded to the Trump salvo, saying she would not participate in the Sept 4th Fox debate pitched by Trump. As of now, it appears that no debate will actually happen between the two presidential candidates, but that could certainly (even likely) change if Harris’s current momentum is aided by her imminent VP pick and the post-convention surge that happens nearly every four years.
So, it stands to reason that Trump will be much more eager to participate in a debate than Harris by the end of August. And I think that the American voters will be best served by both an ABC News debate AND a Fox News debate as originally pitched on Sept 17th.
Now there is real concern among Democratic pollsters that a Fox News environment would be unfairly harsh on Vice President Harris, but I do not agree with that take. Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum would almost certainly present a fair and just environment for both candidates. Yes, they came off as somewhat subservient in an Iowa-based Trump Town Hall they hosted in January, but that could be a function of the event. Town Halls with any candidate on most cable news outlets feel more relaxed and friendlier.
The best evidence that a Fox News debate would be fair is Bret Baier’s interview with Trump in June of 2023, which I believe is the last interview Trump participated in with an actual journalist and not a friendly media surrogate like Laura Ingraham, Maria Bartiromo, or Greg Kelly. Baier confronted Trump on classified documents, using insulting names on political opponents, and yes, election denialism.
“But you lost the 2020 election,” Baier shot back after Trump spouted his baseless, rigged election claim.
The moment came after Trump was asked how he would win back the independent, suburban women voters who were a “hard no” in supporting him despite disapproving of Biden. Trump replied, “First of all, I won in 2020 by a lot, ok? Let’s get that straight. I won in 2020.”
“That’s not what the votes show,” Baier shot back. Trump insisted, “You take a look at Truth the Vote, where they have people stuffing the ballot boxes on tapes –” prompting Baier to respond, “Mr. President, that was all looked into.”
It was a surprisingly rare moment that Fox News viewers heard someone with authority push back on the very election denialism that has eroded so much trust in the democratic process. And given the enormous amount of eyeballs tuned into the as-yet-theoretical Fox News debate, it would be very good for the nation to hear this sort of unabashed fact-checking.
Of course, the back story with Fox News and the truth about the 2020 election is what makes this even more interesting, and pressing for the top-rated cable news network to abide by the truth. In the Spring of 2023, they paid a whopping $787 million settlement to Dominion Voting Systems over allegations that their election claims were false. So Fox News will almost certainly be motivated to correct the record on Trump’s election lies.
Now I don’t think that Harris should agree to a Sept 4th debate on Fox News, leaving open the possibility that Trump wold bail on the Sept 10th debate scheduled (and agreed to) on ABC News. But if the September 17th Fox News debate is still an option (instead of the 4th) then Harris should agree to it and force her opponent to openly discuss his batshit crazy election conspiracies and let moderators Baier and MacCallum clean up that mess.
To be clear, neither Baier nor MacCallum is the reason Fox was forced to cough up three-quarters of a billion dollars. But if these two network veterans fail to hold Trump’s feet to the fire, they will deal the network’s reputation an even more serious blow.
This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.
