The Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD) announced that the University of Notre Dame has withdrawn from hosting the first presidential debate on September 29, 2020.
The first of the three scheduled showdowns this fall between President Trump and former Vice President Biden is being moved from Indiana to Ohio, Fox News reported.
The Commission on Presidential Debates (CDP) stated that the Sept. 29 debate will now be held co-hosted by Case Western Reserve University and Cleveland Clinic and held at the Health Education Campus (HEC) in Cleveland.
We are pleased to announce that the first presidential debate on Sept 29, 2020 will be co-hosted by @cwru and @ClevelandClinic and held at the Health Education Campus (HEC) in Cleveland, OH. Full release here: https://t.co/Pdy0zm3qCy
— CPD (@debates) July 27, 2020
Notre Dame, which is located in South Bend, Indiana, withdrew due to health concerns after conferring with public health officials. University President Rev. John Jenkins made the announcement Monday, saying that the ongoing coronavirus pandemic would have required numerous changes to the program that would have impacted the “educational value” of hosting the debate.
Today, Fr. Jenkins announced that Notre Dame has withdrawn as the host site for the first of the 2020 presidential debates, scheduled for Sept. 29: https://t.co/YCHMc8vOCN#2020DebateND pic.twitter.com/8ogZxzB21j
— Notre Dame (@NotreDame) July 27, 2020
Case Western Reserve University was the site of the 2004 vice presidential debate between Vice President Dick Cheney and Democrat John Edwards.
The commission announced last month that the second debate scheduled for October 15, will now take place in Miami at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts. The debate was moved from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor after the school’s president said the event was “not feasible.”
The final Biden-Trump encounter is still scheduled to be hosted by Belmont University in Nashville, Tenn., on Oct. 22. The vice presidential debate is scheduled for Oct. 7 at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, Utah.
According to Fox News, “Biden’s campaign last month reiterated that it’s agreed to participate in the three planned presidential debates – and criticized the Trump reelection campaign’s recent push for more debates as an “effort to change the subject” and “create a distracting ‘debate about debates.’”
Present Trump’s political team had called for more debates, an earlier start than scheduled, and having a say in the choice of moderators.