Fox News’ Karl Rove argued over the weekend that Republican presidential n0minee Donald Trump has a “harder job” than his Democratic counterpart Kamala Harris ahead of Tuesday night’s pivotal debate between the two.
“Because it may be the only debate, maybe the only shot, that Trump has to actually familiarize an awful lot of the voters with Kamala Harris’s points of view, with her positions on subjects, you think that the stakes are higher for Trump and he has a harder job? Wall Street Journal editorial page editor Paul Gigot asked Rove on Saturday.
“I think he does because she has miraculously grabbed the label of the candidate of change. I mean, we had a situation before July 21 when it was Biden versus Trump where Trump was the candidate of change. But now with Harris on the field, miraculously, she somehow has been able to sort of dissolve the bonds that tied her to the to her superior, the president, and is now seen as the new, different face, maybe because she’s younger and she’s not as well known and hasn’t worn out her welcome with the American people yet,” replied the former advisor to George W. Bush. “I think the debate depends on two things. One is Trump’s ability to highlight her views, because on the big issues: economy, inflation, border security, America’s role in the world, status in the world, he’s got the advantage. But she has got an opportunity to to basically say ‘I’m the new and different candidate. If you want more of the same that we’ve had for the last eight years, Trump followed by Biden, go with him. But if you want something new and different, I’m new and different.'”
“Well, but how can she get away with saying I’m new and different when she was basically in the sidecar of Joe Biden the whole time, and we never heard her say a peep about her differences with with Joe Biden?” asked Gigot in a follow-up.
“In order to go after an incumbent and turn them into, you know, status quo, he has to make a disciplined, focused explanation of why she is responsible. And I’m amazed, for example, now on the question of inflation, I hope in the debate if he wants to win the advantage on that issue that he goes after and explains why she’s responsible for inflation: Here’s the woman who cast the tie breaking vote on on the American Rescue Plan, but which even Larry Summers and Jason Furman, Obama’s economic advisers and secretary of the treasury said, ‘You do that bill, and it’s going to spark inflation because it’s too much money needlessly pumped into our economy,'” said Rove. “Same with the Inflation Reduction Act. She is the tie breaking vote, 50-50 tie in the Senate, as vice president, she breaks it 51-50 in favor of a big spending bill. So he’s got to make a specific attack on the issues and say, ‘She is responsible for it and I have a specific plan that’s my second act that’s going to make things better.”
Watch above via Fox News.
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