Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump will square off in the first televised debate of the political season from 8 to 9:30 p.m. Sept. 26. The debate, moderated by NBC’s Lester Holt, will be divided into six segments of approximately 15 minutes on each major topic. Holt will announce the topics at least one week before the debate. He’ll open with a question, and each candidate will have two minutes to respond. Candidates will also have time to respond to each other.
During this past year we’ve seen these two candidates’ campaigns unfold. The debate will include issues on domestic, foreign and economic policies and more. Throughout the election year there has been an enormous amount of attention paid to Trump because of his comments on specific issues such as immigration, terrorism and refugees. Both candidates will have to reply to these and other topics.
Patrick Moore, Richland government professor, said it’s important to know the positions before you vote. The debates are important because, one of these candidates will be our next commander in chief and the global face of the United States. He also explained thiselection is different from previous ones. In the past, each candidate was a traditional politician with a set of traditional expectations.
Moore said, “Trump is not a traditional politician and we don’t know what to expect from him.” He also said Trump has moved the “Overton window,” or the range of ideas the public is willing to accept and discuss, which is different from previous presidential campaigns. Clinton is a “traditional politician.” Moore said in these debates, we can probably expect to see “Clinton specific, detailed and knowledgeable about issues, compared to Trump who will be vague, broad, generalized and use more rhetoric than details.”
