In an unusual joint statement on Sunday, a dozen of the nation’s leading news organizations urged President Joe Biden and former President Donald J. Trump to publicly commit to participating in debates during the upcoming 2024 presidential election campaign.
The statement, signed by influential television networks, newspapers, wire services and digital outlets, emphasized the vital democratic tradition of presidential candidates engaging in public debates before a national audience.
“Debates have played an essential role in every presidential election of the past 50 years, dating back to 1976,” the news organizations wrote. “It is not too early for candidates who expect to meet the eligibility criteria to publicly state their support for – and their intention to participate in – the commission’s debates planned for this fall.”
The debates for the 2024 election cycle would be sponsored by the non-partisan Commission on Presidential Debates, as they have been since 1988, the outlets proposed. The Commission sets the formats, locations and rules for the events.
Among the prominent media companies endorsing the statement were the major broadcast networks ABC News, CBS News, NBC News and the Fox News Channel. Leading cable outlets CNN, MSNBC, C-SPAN and Univision also joined the call. The letter’s co-signers further included The Associated Press, National Public Radio, the PBS NewsHour, Gannett’s national newspaper USA Today and the upstart NewsNation channel.
The push for the two expected nominees to pledge to debate represents an unusually collective action from America’s ideologically diverse array of news outlets in the hyper-polarized modern media landscape.
President Biden, the Democratic incumbent who will turn 82 shortly after Election Day, has thus far declined to commit to debating his likely Republican challenger, Mr. Trump, citing concerns about the former president’s penchant for violating rules and norms. Some Biden advisors have voiced skepticism about putting the two men on the same stage.
For his part, Mr. Trump has aggressively challenged Mr. Biden to engage him in freewheeling debates “anytime, anywhere.” Last week, the former president’s campaign formally requested the debate commission expand the traditional three-debate schedule.
In the 2020 cycle, Biden and Trump faced off in two debates that generated massive ratings but also harsh criticism over the candidates’ frequent interruptions and personal insults. Their final scheduled encounter was canceled after Trump contracted Covid-19.
The dueling stances from the two putative 2024 nominees have fueled doubts over whether substantive debates will ultimately occur. That uncertainty likely motivated the highly unorthodox joint plea from news outlets across the partisan divide.
While the debates are organized by the non-profit Commission on Presidential Debates, the events have traditionally been broadcast and streamed by major media companies who help set criteria like polling thresholds for candidates to qualify. The debates also generate significant publicity for news outlets covering the high-stakes encounters.
For voters accustomed to divisive partisan rancor, the sight of media competitors collaborating could lend symbolic weight to the push for presidential debates as a democratic imperative transcending individual interests.
“Though it is too early for invitations to be extended to any candidates, it is not too early for candidates who expect to meet the eligibility criteria to publicly state their support for the commission’s debates planned for this fall,” the outlets wrote.
Political scholars have long considered the presidential debates, with their ability to reach tens of millions of viewers, as vital opportunities for the democratic exercise of scrutinizing candidates’ policy positions, leadership qualities and intellectual capabilities.
Whether the unconventional media appeal can motivate mutual commitment from Biden and Trump to upholding the tradition remains to be seen. But the news outlets made clear they see presidential debates as indispensable civic events deserving of the public’s undivided attention.
