The Future of Presidential Debates

The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ASPA as an organization.

By Robert Brescia
July 8, 2024

Introduction

In 2007, Denzel Washington directed and starred in a film about one of Texas’ HBCU (Historically Black Colleges and Universities) Wiley College’s debating team—how they overcame great obstacles to become reigning college champions in 1935. The film served to popularize structured debate in schools and brought to light time-honored, proper ways to conduct political and civic debate. Although we refer to them as debates, presidential debates are not structured—they are more or less Q & A sessions with some rules. Is there room for improvement? You bet there is, and that is the thrust of this article.

The Reach and Impact of Presidential Debates.

Presidential debates are very important because they constitute nearly the sole mechanism of transmitting a presidential candidate’s beliefs, positions, and strategy to all Americans—not just those who follow him or her routinely. If you consider the road leading up to a presidential election, it is comprised of televised major network media interviews, candidate rallies, political conventions, Super Political Action Committee (Super-PAC) advertising and supporting television commentary by anchors and others who have taken up the mantle of a particular party and its chosen candidate. All of this generally amounts to single-sided communication to the “already convinced” or “preaching to the choir”, as the saying goes. While there is nothing wrong with those communications, they serve primarily to “massage the hearts” of those in the political base of one candidate, doing little to cause critical analysis with respect to the other side’s positions. They may only incrementally add to the base of the candidate in a secondary fashion, i.e. someone who attended a candidate’s political rally talking to an undecided neighbor who then decides to attend the next rally or start watching that candidate’s pro-communication on the appropriate television network.

Enter the series of presidential debates to save the day. One of the more venerable public institutions (serving the American public as a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization since 1987 has been the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD). Viewers of current debates are generally obliged to hear both candidates, something no other venue offers. Even if a viewer ardently supports one of the two candidates, he/she listens to the other candidate’s answers to identify and expose misstatements, logical flaws or other inadequacies in that candidate’s argumentation. There are a couple of immediately identifiable problems in our current approach. First, unlike structured debate, presidential candidates often ignore the moderators’ direct and specific questions, choosing to use their time to say what they want to say, constrained only by their allotted time. Second, young people today do not watch cable television networks, choosing instead to engage in social media on their phones. I teach Government & Politics to high school seniors—when I ask them the following morning after a presidential debate if they watched it, precious few say yes. They only get the TikTok snippet version of selected short parts of the debate. I will offer ways to try and overcome both problems toward the close of this article.

What Americans want for Presidential Debates.

The latest presidential debate, not involving the CPD, gave us a glimpse of how such debates can be improved. It featured microphone turn-off past a candidate’s allotted time, no studio audience and a more business-like atmosphere with far fewer “gotcha” moments that seemed to prevail in the previous debates. I believe most Americans prefer such approaches and I would hope that they continue.

With respect to the CPD, I think there is a tremendous amount of potential value in that organization, waiting to be tapped. Like many organizations experience, it is at a turning point and must adapt. I urge the CPD to engage in strategic change with its board members and financial sponsors. The goal is to have robust presidential debates, while not Lincoln-Douglas or Great Debaters structured style, still powerful and clear in their delivery. I also encourage the CPD to bolster its fundraising based on that strategic change to cover the entire debate event cost for the host.

Now to address the problems I mentioned previously—candidates ignoring the direct questions of the moderators and young Americans totally missing the event. If a candidate does not answer a direct question, instead using the time to deliver other remarks, that same amount of time should be additionally awarded to the other candidate as a consequence. With respect to young people and students, we must bring the debates to where they live—social media. I know from experience that asking students, for example, to watch something on a major television network fails.

Summary.

Presidential debates find themselves at a key strategic inflection point. The CPD must assume the role of public debate sector leader immediately, refresh its board, adding advisory board people who wish to see big improvements made, and make change happen. Choose from a wide swath of Americans—and yes, even high school students, teachers, administrators and others. We must identify and implement ways to bring young people into the process, from high school and college students to young working Americans. The future is bright!

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Author: Dr. Robert Brescia is a National Board Certified Teacher (NBCT), serving as Social Studies Department Head at Permian High School in Odessa, TX. The Governor of Texas re-appointed him to the State Board for Educator Certification (SBEC) for a six-year term. Bob has a doctoral degree with distinction in Executive Leadership from The George Washington University. He also teaches ethics to university students and leadership to organizations. Contact him at [email protected].

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