“If we paid a nice sum for the charity, I would love to do that”, he added.
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“Game on”, he tweeted.
The political world has since been graced with almost 36 hours of a surreal back-and-forth over whether the potential “debate of the century”, as dubbed by The Drudge Report on Friday, could actually happen.
Call it chickening out or otherwise, but it appears Trump won’t debate Sanders.
Sanders’ campaign manager Jeff Weaver, however, told CNN Thursday that a debate with Trump could still happen. “We hope that he will not chicken out”, he said.
“Yes I am”, Trump responded.
Donald Trump has backed out of debating Bernie Sanders and, surprising to no one, he’s done it in the most trollish way possible – by blaming everyone but himself. “That remains to be seen”.
Sanders has said he will do everything he can to ensure that Trump does not win the White House. He told reporters late Friday that the Republican comes across as a “tough guy” and asked, “What are you afraid of?”
While Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump danced around the prospect of an unprecedented 1 v 2 pre-convention showdown, the former secretary of state didn’t take the bait and held her tongue.
“He’s a dream”, the real estate magnate said. He raised the possibility of using a debate with the Democratic underdog to raise millions of dollars for “women’s health issues”. But on Friday, Trump, who had less than 48 hours earlier said his debate with Sanders would raise $10 million for women’s charities, did an about face.
“I understand the television business very well”, he continued.
A debate in California would also provide free advertising to Sanders in the biggest primary on the calendar. “And we could have a lot of fun with it”, Trump added.
According to Reuters, the unusual debate idea was developed during Trump’s appearance on ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live on 25 May.
Sanders acknowledged there was some “self-service for Trump” in asking that question.
Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist who was elected to Congress as an independent and has made economic equality a keystone of his campaign, had first challenged Clinton to a California debate.
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The two native New Yorkers – a billionaire businessman and a USA senator – expressed interest on Thursday to hold a one-on-one encounter in California. Moments before the Republican candidate’s announcement, the Sanders campaign said two broadcast networks had agreed to make major charitable contributions in order to host the forum.
