Trump vs. Biden: Inside the Debate Prep Strategies

Former President Trump and President Biden are facing off in a highly anticipated debate, with each candidate employing unique strategies to prepare for the showdown.

In a recent survey of investors by Evercore ISI, 48% picked Trump to win the presidential debate on June 27, while 16% see Biden as the most likely victor. Some 36% expect "both to lose." A USA TODAY/Suffolk University Poll also predicted that former President Trump would win the upcoming head-to-head, with Independents giving Trump a 10-point advantage.

Meanwhile, a "supercomputer", orchestrated by betting odds site Oddspedia concluded, after 1,000 simulations, that President Joe Biden had a 65% chance of beating Donald Trump on Thursday. The CNN Presidential Debate promises to be the Super Bowl of politics, with 60% of voters saying they intend to tune in and 30% saying the debate could determine their vote.

Trump vs. Biden: Inside the Debate Prep Strategies

For Donald Trump, the bar is much higher.  Trump must convince Americans he has the temperament to govern, that his policies will put the nation back on course and deflect concerns that he poses a "threat to democracy."  To win, he must:

* Show Americans his sunny side, which he failed to do in the first 2020 debate.  If Biden falters, show empathy for a man in decline.

Trump vs. Biden: Inside the Debate Prep Strategies

* Trump must relay facts – they are on his side. Remind voters of the good times - that he left the White House with inflation at only 1.4%, and created an economy (pre-COVID-19) which narrowed the wealth gap and drove real incomes higher. Tell people how you can do it again.

* Similarly, he must convince voters that he, not Biden, has the better plan on immigration. Talk up his new plan to give foreigners graduating from college a green card, and his old proposal about merit-based immigration; emphasize the damage done by Biden’s open border, including tens of thousands of fentanyl deaths, terrorists entering the U.S. undetected, and cities collapsing under the weight of the migrant surge. Note the horrific murders of Jocelyn Nungaray and Laken Riley, allegedly by people who were in the country illegally. Bring the victims to life.

Trump vs. Biden: Inside the Debate Prep Strategies

* Trump must counter accusations that he poses a threat to democracy by asserting that trying to lock up your political opponent, who is leading in the polls, is the worst conceivable undermining of our democracy.

* Overall, he must look to the future, and not just review his past accomplishments. Consumer sentiment surveys show Americans have been in the dumps since Joe Biden became president; they want hope and optimism, and Trump must give them that.

If incumbent President Joe Biden can remain standing and be even vaguely coherent for 90 minutes, he will be declared victorious. That is how low a bar Americans have set for the leader of the free world; that is how concerned voters are that our commander-in-chief is not mentally fit for four more years.

* Democrats and their media allies know this, which is why they have launched quite possibly the stupidest argument in U.S. history, charging that videos taken of Biden wondering lost at world gatherings or being led offstage by former President Barack Obama are, to use the words carefully planted by White House spin doctors, "cheap fakes." 

* Biden’s handlers, including his protective wife Jill Biden, are aggressively trying to convince the American people that behind closed doors Joe is sharp as a tack, and that it is "disinformation" to suggest otherwise.

* Sorry, Joe, that doesn’t wash. Countless episodes of muddled messages, forgotten names, blank stares and confusion (like trying to sit on a non-existent chair at recent D-Day ceremonies), don’t lie. Special Counsel Robert Hur, who declared you mentally unable to stand trial for illegally mishandling classified documents, didn’t lie. If he did, you’d be releasing the tapes of the interviews that led to Hur’s assessment, as Republicans have demanded, but you won’t.

* The White House could easily squash all this nay-saying about the president’s cognitive capabilities by allowing Biden to do some press conferences, without the notecards and the prepared questions, or meet with the editorial board of the New York Times, as every prior president has done.

* Better yet: have an independent medical team administer a cognitive test! They won’t because they can’t.