Former President Donald Trump is calling on President Joe Biden to debate him before November’s general election.
Trump, who did not participate in any 2024 Republican primary debates, issued the challenge during a campaign rally in Green Bay, Wisconsin, coinciding with the state’s presidential primary elections.
“As you can see, we have an empty podium here, right? To my right. That’s for Joe Biden. I’m trying to get Joe to debate,” Trump told the crowd Tuesday. “I’m calling on Crooked Joe to debate any time, any place. We’ll do it any way you want, Joe, so that we can discuss, in a friendly manner, the real problems of our country, which are many.”
“With your support, we’re going to win the Wisconsin Republican primary in a landslide, that will be in a few hours,” he said, endorsing Senate candidate Eric Hovde. “And Nov. 5, we are going to win this state, we’re going to win the White House, and we are going to save our country.”
Biden has not definitively committed to debating Trump this election cycle, telling reporters last month that “it depends on his behavior.”
After holding a rally Tuesday afternoon in Grand Rapids, Michigan, Trump also criticized Biden in Wisconsin for marking “Trans Visibility Day” on Easter Sunday, though the day commemorating the transgender community has traditionally fallen on March 31.
“Nov. 5 is going to be called something else. You know what it’s going to be called? Christian Visibility Day, when Christians turn out in numbers that nobody has ever seen before,” Trump said.
Trump proceeded to respond to Biden quipping last week during his $26 million New York fundraiser with former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton that his predecessor would probably not carry his own bag around a golf course, a reference to Trump’s own 77 years of age. Biden is 81.
“Did you ever see him swinging a golf club?” Trump said before pretending to be Biden playing golf.
Although Biden has had problems appealing to minority and younger voters this year, he has improved his standing with seniors, a development that appears not to have escaped Trump’s notice.
“Unlike Biden and the open borders Democrats, I will always protect Medicare and Social Security for our great seniors,” Trump said.
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“On day one, I will terminate Crooked Joe’s insane electric vehicle mandate,” he added in the manufacturing state. “If this Biden’s ban on gasoline cars goes into effect, the U.S. auto industry will be slaughtered. All of your carmaking here and a place that I just got back from, Michigan, will all be gone.”
Trump has, on average, a less than a point advantage over Biden in Wisconsin eight months before the election, 48% to 47.5%, according to RealClearPolitics.