President Donald Trump and Democratic challenger former Vice President Joe Biden are set to square off in their final debate on Thursday in one of the last high-profile opportunities for them to try to change the trajectory of an increasingly contentious campaign.
Here are nine things to know ahead of the debate:
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1. On Thursday night, in an effort to curtail interruptions, Trump and Biden will each have his microphone cut off while his rival delivers an opening two-minute answer to each of the six debate topics, the Commission on Presidential Debates announced.
2. The debate will be carried live on Channel 9 beginning at 9 p.m.
3. With less than two weeks until Election Day, Biden is leading most national polls and has a narrower advantage in the battleground states that could decide the race. More than 42 million people have already cast their ballots.
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4. It is the second debate for the candidates, though it was supposed to be the third. The second scheduled debate was canceled after the Commission on Presidential Debates tried to make that debate a virtual one following Trump’s COVID-19 diagnosis.
5. When the debate was originally announced, the topic was to be foreign affairs. Over the weekend, however, debate moderator Kristen Welker released her list of topics, and the topic of foreign affairs did not make the list.
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6. Instead, Welker is set to ask the candidates about fighting COVID-19, American families, race relations in America, climate change, national security and leadership.
7. The debate will be held in Nashville, Tennessee, at Belmont University.
8. Biden told reporters Thursday in Delaware before his afternoon flight to Nashville that he had undergone testing for COVID-19 and the test came back negative. The White House was asked whether the president had been tested but had not released an update.
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9. There will be no commercial breaks in the 90-minute long debate. It will be divided into six topic segments of 15 minutes each.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
