Trump Questions Fairness of Next Week’s Debate at a Town Hall

Hours after the Trump and Harris campaigns agreed to rules for their first presidential debate, former President Donald J. Trump sought to instill doubt that the debate would be fair, downplayed his need to prepare and suggested he was more worried about the network hosting the debate than his opponent.

Speaking at a Fox News town hall on Wednesday night, Mr. Trump insisted that ABC News, which will host next week’s debate in Philadelphia, was “dishonest,” even though he agreed months ago to allow the network to host a presidential debate.

Pointing to Vice President Kamala Harris’s longtime friendship with a senior executive whose portfolio includes ABC News, Mr. Trump insisted without evidence that Ms. Harris was “going to get the questions in advance.” The network released agreed-upon rules that no topics or questions would be provided to either candidate or campaign.

Mr. Trump’s attempts to question the integrity of the debate echoed a similar effort that preceded his consequential debate in June with President Biden that set off the president’s exit from the race. After taunting Mr. Biden into debating “anytime, anywhere, anyplace,” Mr. Trump sought to play down any potential political consequences as the debate neared by casting the network, moderators and rules as biased.

“Beyond the debate rules published today, which were mutually agreed upon by two campaigns on May 15th, we have made no other agreements,” an ABC News spokeswoman said on Wednesday night. “We look forward to moderating the presidential debate next Tuesday.”

Yet even as he suggested the debate next week would be biased against him, Mr. Trump also tried to present himself as unconcerned about his first head-to-head confrontation with Ms. Harris since she became the Democratic nominee. He insisted that planning would only get him so far and that he would take a similar approach to Ms. Harris that he did to Mr. Biden.