AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
Republican nominee Donald Trump is trying to change the terms of a presidential debate that had been planned for next month. In the spring, Trump and President Biden agreed to hold their second televised debate on ABC News on September 10. But after Biden dropped out of the race last month, Trump would not commit to debating Vice President Kamala Harris instead. Then on Friday night, he said he would debate Harris but on Fox News, and it would take place about a week earlier. NPR national political correspondent Mara Liasson joins us now to explain. Good morning, Mara.
MARA LIASSON, BYLINE: Good morning, Ayesha.
RASCOE: So what's Trump's explanation for this change?
LIASSON: Trump says this isn't a change. The previous deal was if Joe Biden was the candidate. Now that Harris is the candidate, he doesn't have to honor his previous commitment. But that has given the Harris campaign an opening to paint Trump as scared and weak. Harris' new strategist, David Plouffe, an Obama veteran, says Trump is a coward. He said, maybe Trump only wants to debate someone his own age.
RASCOE: OK, so from - when Trump announced this Fox News debate, he made it sound like it was a done deal, right? Like, people thought maybe it was going to happen. But then it turned out Vice President Harris had not agreed to it at all.
LIASSON: Not only had she not agreed to it, it was a complete surprise to the Harris campaign. Trump doubled down, saying, I'll see her September 4, or I won't see her at all, which is quite a difference from I'll debate the Democratic opponent anywhere, anytime. Now, the Harris campaign says it is happy to discuss additional debates, but it's still planning on honoring the original commitment to show up on ABC on September 10, and maybe she will have the stage all to herself.
RASCOE: Well, it looks like Trump may be upstaged again very soon. Harris is expected to announce her vice presidential pick any moment now, definitely before Tuesday because that's when she says she will start campaigning with him. And it will be a him, right, Mara?
LIASSON: It will be a him. She's down to just a few choices. They're all men. They're all white. They're all politically moderate. You know, there are a lot of strategies for picking a vice president. Some are chosen to help win battleground states or maybe bring a particular constituency like Mike did - Mike Pence did for Donald Trump in 2016 when he brought a lot of evangelical voters.
Sometimes, it's to reinforce a message, the way Al Gore did for Bill Clinton, two young border state moderates, or JD Vance was supposed to do for Donald Trump, double down on the MAGA movement. But Harris' advisors say one of her biggest criteria is that she wants to pick somebody that she can govern with.
RASCOE: Pennsylvania's Democratic governor Josh Shapiro has been getting a lot of buzz. Tell us about him 'cause most people may not know much about him.
LIASSON: Right, He's extremely popular in Pennsylvania. He won the statewide vote there by large margins. Pennsylvania is an extremely important battleground state. Democrats have to win it. Josh Shapiro is Jewish, like Harris' husband. Some Democrats worry about that. He also wrote an op-ed in his college newspaper 30 years ago. And, of course, everything he's said and done is now under a microscope. But he said in that op-ed that Palestinians were too battle-minded to establish a peaceful homeland. Now he says, he wrote that when he was 20, and he currently believes very firmly in a two-state solution.
RASCOE: And the other four vice presidential contenders - can you grow - go through them in the time that we have left?
LIASSON: Yes. Well, the other two - top two contenders are Mark Kelly and Tim Walz. Kelly is the senator from Arizona, another important battleground state. He's a former astronaut and a naval aviator. His wife is former U.S. Congresswoman Gabby Giffords, who was shot in the head in an assassination attempt in 2011 and left with a grievous brain injury. Kelly is a gun owner. He's also in favor of gun control. He represents a border state. He's very knowledgeable about immigration, which is one of Harris' biggest vulnerabilities.
And then you have Tim Walz. He's the governor of Minnesota, not a battleground state. But he is a Midwestern guy who Democrats think could help them secure the blue wall states of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. And he recently captured the hearts and minds of Democrats when he started this meme of calling Trump and the Republicans weird. As one Democrat told me about Walz - they said, he looks like Archie Bunker, and they meant that as a political plus.
RASCOE: NPR national political correspondent Mara Liasson, thank you so much for coming on.
LIASSON: You're welcome. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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