President Biden says he's 'happy to debate' Trump: Election 2024

NEW YORK (AP) — President Joe Biden said Friday that he is willing to debate his presumptive Republican opponent, Donald Trump, later this fall – his most definitive comment yet on the issue.

Trump said he was ready, though he questioned Bidens’s willingness.

Biden’s comment came during an interview with the Sirius XM radio host Howard Stern, who asked him whether he would participate in debates against Trump.

“I am, somewhere. I don’t know when,” Biden said. “But I’m happy to debate him.”

So far, Biden’s reelection campaign had declined to commit to participating in the debates, a hallmark of every general election presidential campaign since 1976.

Biden himself had also been vague, saying in March that whether he debated Trump “depends on his behavior.” The two men debated twice during the 2020 general election — a campaign year constrained significantly by COVID-19 restrictions — and Biden was notably irritated by Trump’s antics in the chaotic first debate that year.