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Washington D.C., United States of America (USA)
Vice President Kamala Harris and Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump will battle it out in the presidential debate in Philadelphia hosted by ABC News. (Image: Reuters)
Donald Trump has declined a third debate with Kamala Harris, claiming victory despite polls showing Harris won the previous debate.
Former US President Donald Trump said on Thursday that he would not participate in another presidential debate against Kamala Harris ahead of the November 5 US election. Trump’s statement came after some polls indicated his rival’s victory in the debate, which was hosted this week.
“THERE WILL BE NO THIRD DEBATE!” the Republican nominee wrote on his social media site Truth Social.
During an interview with the New York Post, the 78-year-old said, “We just don’t think that there’s any need for it,” Trump told the New York Post. “We’ve done two. You know, one against Biden [on June 27]one against Comrade Kamala. I did well. I did really well,” the 78-year-old said during a phone interview.
Speaking at a rally shortly after Trump’s post went live, Harris said, “I believe we owe it to the voters to have another debate.”
While Trump, in his post, said that polls showed he won the debate, several surveys showed that respondents thought Harris did better.
What Polls Say
Most debate watchers said Harris outperformed Trump, according to a CNN poll released shortly after the debate. YouGov showed 54 per cent of those surveyed said Harris won while 31 per cent said Trump was the victor. According to a Reuters/Ipsos poll that closed on Thursday, Harris leads Trump 47 per cent to 42 per cent in the race to win the November 5 presidential election, increasing her advantage after a debate against the former President that voters largely think she won.
The two-day poll showed Harris with a five percentage point lead among registered voters, just above the four-point advantage she had over Trump in an August 21-28 Reuters/Ipsos poll. Among voters who said they had heard at least something about Tuesday’s debate, 53 per cent said Harris won and 24 per cent said Trump won, with the rest saying neither had or not answering the poll. Some 52 per cent of those familiar with the debate said Trump stumbled and didn’t appear sharp, while 21 per cent said that of Harris. Among Republican voters, one in five said Trump didn’t appear sharp.
Harris Vs Trump
Harris put Trump on the defensive in a combative presidential debate in Philadelphia. Some 52 per cent of voters familiar with the debate said Harris “gave the impression of having higher moral integrity,” compared to 29 per cent who said the same of Trump. Meanwhile, some 53 per cent of Republican voters in the poll said Trump won the debate, compared to 91 per cent of Democrats who said she was the victor. Among Republicans, 31 per cent said no one won and 14 per cent said Harris got the better of Trump.
Ninety-one per cent of registered voters in the poll said they had heard at least something of the debate and 44 per cent said they had heard a great deal.
The debate, hosted by ABC News, attracted 67.1 million television viewers, according to Nielsen data, topping the roughly 51 million people who watched Trump debate then-candidate President Joe Biden in June. Biden’s disastrous performance in that debate led to widespread calls by the 81-year-old leader’s fellow Democrats for him to drop his re-election bid, which he did in July.
(With agency inputs)
