Now that the U.S. presidential nominating conventions have ended, the next key date on the campaign calendar is Tuesday, September 29 — the race’s first presidential debate, the VOA reported, Monday.
Republican President Donald Trump and his Democratic Party rival, former vice president Joe Biden, spent the week after the conventions making their opening arguments in some of the U.S. States critical to winning the election, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, North Carolina.
“I think that we can expect to see a rowdy debate between the two presidential candidates,” said Jennifer Mercieca, assistant professor of Communications at Texas A&M University. “Both of these candidates are fighters.”
Read also: U.S Elections: Likely Possibilities As Joe Biden Picks Running Mate
Mercieca says indications of Trump’s debating style can be found in how he described his 2016 campaign as a “counterpunch.”
“He regularly uses ad hominem attacks, which is attacking the person instead of their argument. And he isn’t shy to do that, to mock people and bully them during a debate. He did that in 2016,” she said, adding that Biden’s debating history shows he will stand his ground.
“We saw in 2012 that his vice-presidential debate was similar, I think, to Trump in style and that he [Biden] sort of mocked his opposition a little bit. He laughed at him [Paul Ryan], you know, sort of right in his face,”
Read also: Obama Slams Trump As Unfit, Says Biden Will Preserve US Democracy
Mercieca said. “I don’t think that he [Biden] goes to the extremes that Donald Trump does in terms of mocking his opposition or threatening them. But, you know, he’s definitely capable of standing his ground and not allowing himself to be intimidated.”
Source: VOICE OF AMERICA
