Former President Donald Trump will be stepping into a left-wing minefield on Thursday when he debates President Biden on CNN, whose moderators have compared him to Adolf Hitler.
In May, Mr. Trump immediately accepted CNN’s invitation to debate Mr. Biden. The president took to social media and directly challenged his rival to participate.
Since then, Trump supporters have lamented what they call unfavorable terms of the debate. The candidates will have no live audience and no chance to interrupt each other. Jake Tapper and Dana Bash have been chosen as the moderators.
“Trump agreed to the moderators and rules that clearly favor Biden,” political analyst and Democratic campaign consultant Douglas Schoen said. “Fully expect that Trump will be at a significant disadvantage of his own making on Thursday night.”
The Trump campaign on Monday battled CNN hosts ahead of the debate, which will take place at the network’s Atlanta headquarters.
They made the case that Ms. Bash and Mr. Tapper have broadcast their disdain for Mr. Trump. In one instance, they accused Mr. Trump of using “the dehumanizing rhetoric of Adolf Hitler.” In another, they called his presidency a “long national nightmare.”
SEE ALSO: Trump changes tone before debate after spending months painting Biden as incompetent
Trump campaign spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt attempted to call out the network’s bias against the former president in a CNN segment Monday morning, but the show’s host abruptly cut her off midsentence.
Before CNN ended the interview, Ms. Leavitt signaled that the Trump campaign knows what it is facing by agreeing to debate terms largely set by the network and the Biden campaign team.
Mr. Trump, she said, “is knowingly going into a hostile environment on this very network, on CNN, with debate moderators who have made their opinions about him very well known over the past eight years. And their biased coverage of him.”
Former Trump adviser Steve Bannon told Ms. Leavitt on his “War Room” show that CNN must apologize for cutting off her interview or Mr. Trump “should cancel” his appearance Thursday.
Mr. Bannon said the “entire news apparatus” at CNN is pitted against Mr. Trump.
Mr. Trump, 78, isn’t backing down from the debate. Over the weekend, he crowdsourced his battle plan at a rally in Philadelphia by asking supporters how he should approach Mr. Biden, 81.
“Should I be tough and nasty and just say, ‘You’re the worst president in history’?” Mr. Trump teased the crowd. “Or should I be nice and calm and let him speak?”
On Monday, Mr. Trump challenged Mr. Biden to take a drug test before the debate. He suggested that his opponent would take drugs to avoid well-documented signs of lagging mental performance.
“DRUG TEST FOR CROOKED JOE BIDEN??? I WOULD ALSO IMMEDIATELY AGREE TO ONE,” Mr. Trump posted on his social media site.
Campaign spokesman Steven Cheung promised, if given a “fair opportunity” at the debate, that the former president will “present his vision for America … and lay out exactly how he plans to improve the lives of every American suffering from everything becoming too expensive and every community being turned into a border community thanks to Joe Biden’s incompetence.”
Mr. Trump will almost certainly face questions at the debate about the 2020 election, his felony conviction in the New York hush money trial and his other criminal cases. Mr. Biden will undoubtedly be asked about inflation, the immigration crisis at the southern border and son Hunter Biden’s legal troubles.
Mr. Schoen said to expect Mr. Biden to be “as well prepared as he possibly can be given the time the current president has put into preparation and memorizing stock answers and quips.”
Mr. Biden’s mental acuity will be a central part of the debate that the Trump team hopes to expose to voters, which may explain why the former president agreed to the terms.
“I think Trump believed a stacked deck was better than no deck at all,” Mr. Schoen said.
Mr. Tapper’s disdain for Mr. Trump is well documented. The CNN host called Mr. Trump reckless, arrogant and ignorant during his first term in office and warned that he tried to “kill democracy” when he protested the results of the 2020 presidential election and would try to do so again.
Ms. Bash publicly bemoaned the Supreme Court decision this year that blocked Colorado from removing Mr. Trump from the primary ballot.
Mr. Trump, meanwhile, has fueled the animosity with CNN by publicly criticizing the moderators with demeaning nicknames, including “Fake Tapper.”
Mr. Trump told podcaster Logan Paul that he helped set some of the debate rules, including one that requires both candidates to stand instead of being seated.
He said he believes Mr. Biden didn’t want to debate at all.
“They thought that I wouldn’t do it because it’s CNN, but I’ve done plenty of CNN,” Mr. Trump said. “I did a town hall not so long ago with CNN that worked out well. But I think they’ll be fair. I think they’re going to try to be fair — as fair as they can be.”
• Susan Ferrechio can be reached at sferrechio@washingtontimes.com.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.