Harris’ campaign 'lied' about agreeing to a second debate and is dodging dates put forth by Trump’s team

The problems over agreeing to presidential debates between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump continue. This Friday, the Republican campaign accused the vice president's team of lying after the Democratic campaign assured reporters Thursday that a second debate in October had been agreed upon.

However, Trump's campaign denied the claim, calling it false and asserting that the Democratic nominee does not want to debate.

According to Karoline Leavitt, the Trump campaign's national press secretary, Kamala Harris' team is avoiding the three proposed debate dates and seeking to have the second debate in October, when early voting has already begun in several states.

"Let’s be clear: President Trump will be on the debate stage THREE times with Fox News, ABC and NBC/Telemundo. Likewise, Senator Vance will show up to debate Tim Walz on TWO occasions, on September 18 with CNN and October 1 with CBS. If Harris and Walz don’t show up, an empty podium can stand in their place, proving to the American people just how weak they are," Karoline Leavitt told the Daily Caller.

Leavitt's statements come after the Harris campaign asserted that the Trump campaign had "accepted our proposal for three debates — two presidential and a vice presidential debate."

In a statement on Thursday, the Harris campaign said that if Trump shows up for the Sept. 10 debate, then Americans "will have another opportunity to see the vice president and Donald Trump on the debate stage in October." However, Leavitt claimed there was never any discussion of the October proposal and that the Harris campaign sought to manipulate the facts to hide that they don't want to debate.

"There’s been no proposal from a network for an October debate. They’re just throwing that out there needlessly," Leavitt told the Daily Caller. "President Trump committed to three debates. Kamala should commit to the same three debates. We both, both campaigns, received the exact same debate invitations from those three networks."

Leavitt's words prove that the Harris campaign misled the public after claiming Thursday that "the debate about debates is over."

"Harris’s advisors do not trust her competence and skills to debate President Trump. So they are trying to get away with seeing how she performs on the September debate, and then maybe they’ll commit to an October debate. That’s not how this works (...) Kamala Harris is a COWARD. She refuses to do a press conference, refuses to take a sit-down interview, and refuses to accept the three debate invitations agreed to by President Trump. Harris won’t speak unscripted because she can’t defend her dangerously liberal record and failed four years in the White House."

The problems in agreeing to debates between the two campaigns come on the heels of two events that marked the presidential race.

The first was the agreement between the two campaign teams to abandon the typical process of working with the Commission on Presidential Debates to set up meetings between the candidates. This caused the two campaigns to negotiate with each other and agree with the television networks on the time, place and rules for the debates.

The second event was President Joe Biden's dismal performance in the first presidential debate. That performance provoked a wave of severe criticism against what should have been the Democratic nominee, who ended up stepping aside and supporting Harris after his party, donors and the mainstream media turned their backs on him.

Based on that experience, Democrats understand that the second presidential debate, scheduled for Sept. 10, will be a key test to evaluate Harris' ability to present her ideas and stand up to Trump.