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Kamala Harris has trolled Donald Trump by using his words against him after the Republican presidential nominee backed out of a proposed television debate.
“What happened to ‘any time, any place’?” the vice president posted on X late on Thursday night.
Trump had previously used those words back in March to lay down the gauntlet to President Joe Biden as the two rivals sparred about when and where they would face each other on the debate stage.
But, now that Biden has stepped aside and Harris has become the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, the former president appears to have gotten cold feet.
On Thursday, Harris was asked by reporters at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland about debating Trump.
She said she was “ready” to go head-to-head with the former president on stage but accused him of “backpedaling” on his commitment to the debate provisionally scheduled for September 10 on ABC News.
“I have agreed to the previously agreed upon September 10 debate,” she said.
“He agreed to that previously. Now, here he is backpedaling and I’m ready and I think the voters deserve to see the split screen that exists in this race on a debate stage and so I’m ready to go.”
Trump’s campaign team subsequently confirmed that he would not commit to debating Harris – at least not yet – blaming Democratic instability for the u-turn.
“Given the continued political chaos surrounding Crooked Joe Biden and the Democrat Party, general election details cannot be finalized until Democrats formally decide on their nominee,” the Trump campaign’s communications director Steven Cheung said in a statement.
“There is a strong sense by many in the Democrat Party – namely Barack Hussein Obama – that Kamala Harris is a Marxist fraud who cannot beat President Trump, and they are still holding out for someone ‘better.’
“Therefore, it would be inappropriate to schedule things with Harris because Democrats very well could still change their minds.”
Cheung’s offer of an explanation does not acknowledge that neither Biden nor Trump were their respective parties’ nominees during the first presidential debate in Atlanta on June 27. Like Harris, both candidates were merely the presumptive nominees at the time.
There now appears to be little doubt that Harris will be confirmed as the party’s presidential nominee at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago next month, as she has already secured more than enough delegates to meet the threshold and no major challengers have emerged to rival her.
The majority of party big beasts like Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries have also publicly backed her.
Former president Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama have now joined them in the wake of Cheung’s statement, backing Harris in a video posted to social media on Friday, having reportedly only withheld their endorsement so as not to overshadow Biden’s big moment as he exited the race.
Trump told reporters earlier this week that he would “absolutely” be prepared to debate Harris but alleged political bias at ABC News and hinted that he would prefer a more sympathetic conservative broadcaster like Fox News to host. Fox News has invited the two candidates to a debate on the network on September 17.
His adviser Jason Miller has insisted that further presidential debates will happen.
“Not only will there be another debate, but there should be multiple debates,” he said.
“We do think there should be some diversification in the outlets for who hosts a debate, but I think the public would be sold short if we only did one debate against Kamala Harris in the general election.”
