Fri 23 October 2020:
The televised encounter in Nashville, Tennessee, represented one of Trump’s last remaining opportunities to reshape a campaign dominated by a pandemic that has killed more than 221,000 people in the United States. Opinion polls show Trump is trailing Biden, though the contest is tighter in some battleground states likely to decide the election.
In their second and final debate of the presidential campaign, President Donald Trump and Democratic candidate Joe Biden clashed over the novel coronavirus less than two weeks before elections.
During the event at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee, Trump once again defended his approach to fighting the virus and claimed that fewer people have died from the “worldwide pandemic” than models predicted.
“We are fighting it. We are fighting it very hard,” said Trump, adding there were big spikes in Florida, Arizona and Texas which he said are “gone.”
“And there are some spikes and surges in other places. They will soon be gone,” he said.
Trump repeated his accusations that Biden and his son Hunter engaged in unethical practices in China and Ukraine. No evidence has been verified to support the allegations, and Biden called them false and discredited.
Biden accused Trump of skirting his taxes, citing a New York Times investigation that reported Trump’s tax returns show he paid almost no federal income tax over more than 20 years.
“Release your tax returns or stop talking about corruption,” Biden said.
Trump, who has broken with decades of precedent in refusing to release his tax returns, said he had paid “millions.” He again said he would release his returns only once a longstanding audit was completed.
The candidates clashed over healthcare, China policy and – after months of anti-racism protests – race relations with Biden saying Trump was “one of the most racist presidents” in history.
“He pours fuel on every single racist fire,” Biden said. “This guy has a dog whistle as big as a foghorn.”
Trump responded by criticizing Biden’s authorship of a 1994 crime bill that increased incarceration of minority defendants while asserting that he had done more for Black Americans than any president with the “possible” exception of Abraham Lincoln in the 1860s.
Biden recalled that more than 220,000 Americans are dead due to the disease and said: “Anyone who’s responsible for that many deaths should not remain as president of the United States of America.”
Biden claimed that the expectation is that “we’ll have another 200,000 Americans dead in the time between now and the end of the year” and that Trump does not have a comprehensive plan to fight the coronavirus.
The approximately 200 attendees had their temperatures checked before entering the venue, and everyone was required to wear a medical mask at all times.
According to Johns Hopkins University, the coronavirus has killed at least 223,000 people across the US and infected more than 8.4 million others.
