What Kentucky lawmakers expect in the first presidential debate

WASHINGTON — For the first time in more than three years, President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump will debate each other Thursday, June 27, in their bid to secure another term in the White House.

State Rep. Andy Barr, R-Lexington, who was the first of the Kentucky delegation to endorse Trump, said he expects Biden will focus on Trump’s recent conviction.

“What I expect is that the current president, President Biden, will try to focus on something other than his own record, and he will probably try to point to the New York court ruling,” he said.

Biden’s team last month highlighted the guilty verdict in Trump’s hush money case, calling him a “convicted felon.”

“What President Trump needs to say, and what I expect him to say, is, ‘While President Biden is trying to focus on me, I am focused on you, the American people, and I am committed to getting back to the policies that we had under the previous administration, when we had price stability, low inflation, and economic growth,’” Barr said.

State Rep. Morgan McGarvey, D-Louisville, Kentucky’s only Democrat in Congress, said that while voters are eager to listen in, they already know the candidates and their visions.

“I think we’re going to see two very different visions for America,” McGarvey said. “We know what Donald Trump’s America looks like. It’s divisive. It’s hate. It’s fear.”

“And now we have a record of what Joe Biden’s America looks like. It’s coming together. It’s moving forward. It creates jobs. It ensures that people have rights and freedoms and that we make a better world. And I think so too. That will come out tomorrow.”

With just over four months until the election, Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., is holding off on endorsing Trump and said he is looking for a promise that the former president will provide access to Paul’s investigation into the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“While I support Donald Trump, I have not decided to campaign for him or formally endorse him because I am concerned about all the debt that we have added during the Trump administration,” Paul said Tuesday. “I am concerned about the lockdowns. I did not like having all the businesses closed.”

Spectrum News will simulcast the debate, hosted by CNN. The broadcast will air on Thursday, June 27 at 9:00 PM EDT in Atlanta and is expected to last 90 minutes. There will be no studio audience.