Trump Eclipsed by Democrats as He Heads to G-20 Summit in Japan
President says he plans to watch presidential debate from Air Force One
(Bloomberg) -- President Donald Trump found himself in an unfamiliar position Wednesday night, serving as a backdrop rather than the main attraction as his Democratic rivals kicked off a series of presidential debates.
And he didn’t yield the spotlight easily. About a half-hour into the first debate, Trump tweeted from Air Force One on his way to Japan for the Group of 20 summit: “BORING!”
The comment followed a debate over health-care policy, but risked coming across as insensitive. It landed just as the Democratic candidates began to talk about immigration -- specifically a haunting photo circulated widely Wednesday of a father and his daughter who had drowned trying to cross the U.S.-Mexico border.
The tweet came just hours after he damped expectations that he’d live-tweet the event. Shortly after departing Washington, he instead directed his Twitter followers to the accounts for his campaign and campaign staff, adding “Sorry, I’m on Air Force One, off to save the Free World!”
“I’m going to watch it because I have to,” Trump said Wednesday morning in an interview with Fox Business Network. “That’s part of my life, you know, it’s part of my life.”
Yet not long after telling his followers to look elsewhere, he again lashed out at Joe Biden, the Democratic front-runner.
The second debate, scheduled for Thursday night in Miami, could prove the bigger annoyance to the president. It will take place while he’s meeting with world leaders in Japan, likely eating into news coverage of his moment on the world stage, where he could make headway on a trade deal with China and the standoff with Iran.
Trump has been known to reclaim the spotlight with attacks on Twitter. When Beto O’Rourke was soaking up media attention in April, Trump fired off a flurry of 50 Tweets in 24 hours. The move became a story in itself and was a lead talking point on morning cable news.
On Wednesday night, one of his favorite targets, Senator Elizabeth Warren, will take center stage.
Trump grabbed the spotlight before he left for Japan. He called in to Maria Bartiromo’s program on the Fox Business Network and said he’d prefer Mario Draghi, president of the European Central Bank, at the helm of U.S. monetary policy instead of Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell.
Trump also fired off incendiary tweets attacking the co-captain of the U.S. women’s national soccer team for saying she’s not going to visit the White House after this year’s World Cup.
Regardless of what Trump does during the debates, he will have a presence as the center of Democrats’ ire. The question is whether the candidates will direct the bulk of their attacks against the president or each other.
Some of Trump’s advisers say the best-case scenario would be for the public’s attention to be focused on positions Democrats take on health care, immigration, and taxes, which they say are too extreme for swing voters. They are counting on a drawn-out Democratic primary season that leaves the winner damaged and low on cash.
Even if Trump remains quiet, his political surrogates won’t. His campaign has a war room and rapid response team in place, including staff in Miami, prepared to respond to Democrats’ attacks on social media. And the pro-Trump super-political action committee, America Rising, will be releasing opposition research it has collected on the candidates on social media and a live blog. Trump’s family -- including his outspoken son, Donald Trump Jr. -- is also expected to chime in.
To contact the reporter on this story: Shannon Pettypiece in Washington at spettypiece@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alex Wayne at awayne3@bloomberg.net, Joshua Gallu, John Harney
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