Notre Dame Withdraws As Host Of First Presidential Debate

The University of Notre Dame announced Monday that it had withdrawn as the host site for the first head-to-head presidential debate between President Trump and his presumed Democratic rival, former Vice President Joe Biden. “The necessary health precautions would have greatly diminished the educational value of hosting the debate on our campus,” said the Rev. John I. Jenkins, the university’s president.

In a letter to the Notre Dame community, Rev. Jenkins said that "the inevitable reduction in student attendance in the debate hall, volunteer opportunities and ancillary educational events undermined the primary benefit of hosting — to provide our students with a meaningful opportunity to engage in the American political process."

Notre Dame was set to kick off the 2020 presidential and vice-presidential debate series, with the first debate set for September 29. The Commission on Presidential Debates, in a news release, said Case Western Reserve University—in collaboration with the Cleveland Clinic—would step in to replace Notre Dame, and host the first debate at the Health Education Campus in Cleveland. The Cleveland Clinic had been selected after the emergence of the coronavirus as an adviser to the Commission on health security for the presidential debates.

A month ago, the University of Michigan withdrew as host for the second presidential debate on October 15. That debate has been moved to the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts in Miami. The third debate is still scheduled for Belmont University in Nashville on October 22. The single vice-presidential debate remains scheduled for October 7 at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City.

Each of the debates will be 90 minutes, running from 9:00 p.m. ET through 10:30 p.m., without commercial breaks, and will be carried by all of the major networks on broadcast and cable. Moderators will be announced at a later date.