Vice President Harris and former President Trump are preparing for one of the biggest moments of this year's election campaign: their first, and likely only, televised debate.
The showdown will take place Tuesday in Philadelphia, hosted by ABC News and moderated by David Muir and Lindsay Davis.
The debate could be crucial in what is a very close election campaign.
An average of polls managed by The Hill and Decision Desk HQ (DDHQ) gives Harris a nearly 4-point lead, but the margin of error is much smaller in the seven battleground states that are likely to decide the election.
DDHQ currently estimates that Harris has a 55% chance of winning in November.
The final presidential debate between President Trump and President Biden took place on June 27, with Biden dropping out of the race. This debate is unlikely to create such a dramatic stir, but it will be just as important.
Both candidates have three main goals:
Vice President Harris
Avoid a big mistake
Harris goes into the debate with the wind at her back.
Since Biden withdrew, she has enjoyed an unusually long married life.
She rose in the polls amid a wave of Democratic enthusiasm, was lauded at a successful convention and had a surging campaign coffers.
On Friday, her campaign and affiliates said they raised $361 million in August and had $404 million in cash ahead of Election Day — more than $100 million more than the Trump campaign's $295 million.
For Harris, the biggest goal of the debate is to avoid any gaffes, false statements or a clash with Trump that would put an end to her momentum.
These moments are inherently difficult to predict: unusual aspects of a debate have proved significant in the past, such as when then-President George H.W. Bush stared impatiently at the watch during his debate with Bill Clinton in 1992, or when then-Vice President Al Gore sighed repeatedly during his debate with George W. Bush eight years later.
Harris doesn't need to stand out: Her recent CNN interview, her first as a candidate, was neither great nor terrible.
If the debate goes through without any major issues, Harris will have achieved one of her goals.
Win the middle
The election is likely to be decided by a small number of moderate voters, and Harris has already shifted her positions on some issues in an attempt to win their support.
The most prominent example is fracking, which she called for a ban on during the 2020 primary campaign. She no longer supports a ban.
She's also reversed course from her support for Medicare for All, and while she suggested during the 2020 primary that she wanted to decriminalize illegal border crossings, she now says she wants “consequences.”
All of this is an effort to neutralize attacks by President Trump and his allies who have sought to paint Harris as an “extremist” or, as they have dubbed her, “Comrade Kamala.”
But immigration, in particular, remains a weak spot for Ms. Harris. It's one of the issues of greatest concern for the administration in public opinion polls, and she was closely associated with it in the early days of the Biden administration. Her answers on immigration will likely come under particular scrutiny.
Harris also needs to allay doubts about her credibility, a concern heightened by her recent changes in position.
Refuting Trump's claims
Biden's awkward performance in the June debate raised new levels of concern about his cognitive abilities.
But there was another, less dramatic, but still important, effect: It allowed Trump to make his case largely unhindered.
Harris, a former prosecutor who is more than 20 years younger than Biden, is expected to be much stronger in this regard.
She does have one hurdle to overcome: A request from her team to keep the microphones of candidates who aren't speaking open was ultimately denied, so her microphone will be muted when Trump is speaking, and vice versa.
But even if Harris' ability to directly intervene is limited, she will likely want to take an aggressive stance against Trump and apply far more pressure on him than Biden has been able to.
Former President Trump
Avoid disrespect with Harris
The former president has serious issues with female voters.
Two recent polls from ABC News and Reuters found Trump trailing Harris by 13 points among women, a much larger margin than the advantage he enjoys among men.
On Tuesday, President Trump is scheduled to debate a candidate seeking to become the first female president.
The former president would pose great danger if he were to be seen as disrespectful towards Harris while sharing the same stage.
Trump has already attempted to belittle Harris' intelligence, falsely claiming she only recently identified as black, and shared crude sexual innuendos about the vice president on social media.
Of course, Trump's tendency to make insensitive remarks about women goes beyond Harris. The “Access Hollywood” tapes nearly toppled his 2016 campaign, and on Friday, while denying past sexual assault allegations, he sparked a new furor by saying of one of his accusers, “She wouldn't have been elected.”
During his 2016 debate with Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton, Trump's behaviour was controversial as he wandered around the stage behind the former Secretary of State, but it clearly did not derail his election victory.
He may have less room for error against Harris.
Provide a measure of consistency and detail
Trump's communication style is likely never to change, for better or for worse.
His supporters welcome his incendiary, slogan-raising rhetoric, but his opponents dislike the very same characteristics.
But in such a close election, swing voters will want to know what Trump plans to do for a second term.
The danger is that Trump may waver on specifics, even when politely pressed.
Last week, while speaking at the Economic Club of New York, he was asked what he would do to alleviate the costs of child care.
His answers were so bizarre and incoherent that Democrats embraced them with glee.
Trump being Trump, no one expects him to offer any detailed explanation on Tuesday.
But things like “parenting moments” can seriously damage him.
Look to the future rather than the past
Trump rarely goes public without reiterating many of his grievances.
The complaints typically cover the expected areas of the 2020 election, the lawsuits against Trump and media coverage, with frequent mentions of Hillary Clinton's email server and Russian collusion allegations eight years after the 2016 election.
It's another Trump habit that has been embraced by his “Make America Great Again” supporters, but even many Republicans worry it won't do much to win new supporters at all.
Many party members would welcome a compelling template for what Trump would do to improve the lives of his constituents, especially those facing a tough election in November.
