It will be Kamala Harris and Donald Trump’s first face-to-face meeting, and millions of Americans will be able to witness it.
The Democratic vice president and Republican former president will square off in Philadelphia on Tuesday in their first — and possibly only — televised debate before what promises to be a tense 2024 election.
The high-stakes ABC debate will be the first opportunity for US voters to witness the two go head-to-head after a month of shadow-boxing since President Joe Biden resigned as a candidate.
The gloves will come off in what will be a vital test for both.
Harris, 59, has energized and united the Democratic Party, and she will now face an opponent who has labeled her “crazy” and subjected her to racist and sexist taunts.
America’s first female, Black, and South Asian vice president has overtaken Donald Trump’s poll lead, but she believes she is still the “underdog” in a close contest.
Knowing what is at stake, she has spent five days holed up in the adjacent city of Pittsburgh preparing for the discussion.
Meanwhile, the 78-year-old Trump is anticipated to take a strong stance when Harris entered the race, upending his White House bid and making him the oldest contender in US history.
“These are two very different candidates that have previously never met in person,” Erin Christie, of the Rutgers University School of Communication and Information, told AFP.
“So it will prove to be a very enlightening debate which could even be the make-it-or-break-it factor in the election.”
That lack of any prior face time is a result of Trump having refused to attend Biden’s inauguration after falsely claiming he was cheated in the 2020 election.
Adding an extra frisson is the fact that the debate is happening in Pennsylvania, the most bitterly-fought of the battleground states that will decide the election.
Tuesday’s debate could meanwhile be the last. Harris and Trump have not agreed to any more, and this one is only happening after a bitter row ended with Harris’s camp reluctantly agreeing to have the candidates’ microphones muted while the other is speaking.
Americans will now be watching closely to see how it actually plays out on stage.
‘Break out the popcorn’
While perspectives range on how much US presidential debates influence polling, there is no doubt that they may produce political earthquakes on occasion.
It’s been just over two months since Biden was forced to withdraw his candidacy for a second term after a disastrous debate with Trump raised Democratic concerns about his age and mental fitness.
Biden will be watching on Tuesday, according to his spokeswoman, Karine Jean-Pierre, on Friday. “The vice president is intelligent. “She is someone who knows how to get the job done,” said Jean-Pierre, a former senior assistant to Harris during her unsuccessful 2020 campaign.
While few expect something as dramatic as Tuesday’s meeting between Trump and Harris, it still has the potential to be a watershed moment in the last push to November 5.
Regardless of their differences, both will seek to reach out to a core of undecided voters in a severely fragmented America.
In the red corner, Harris will depend on her coolly cutting style and prosecutorial experience as she takes on a convicted criminal who is also accused of conspiring to reverse his 2020 election loss to Biden.
However, she will continue to face sexist and racist prejudices about “angry Black women,” according to Rebecca Gill, a political science professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
While Harris will under pressure to be less ambiguous on policy, her team is expected to maintain the “do no harm” strategy that has resulted in Harris giving only one broadcast interview since replacing Biden.
In the blue corner, Trump’s challenge will be determining how much Trump supporters desire.
Trump’s furious, rambling style energizes his right-wing base, but it remains to be seen how it will fare against a candidate trying to be America’s first Black female president.
All eyes will be on ABC’s moderators to see whether they can fact-check what will undoubtedly be a stream of falsehoods, based on Trump’s six prior presidential debates.
“This debate may go down in the history books. Break out the popcorn,” said Andrew Koneschusky, a former press secretary for US Senate leader Chuck Schumer.