WATCH: Trump holds news conference at Mar-a-Lago

PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — Donald Trump recommitted to debating Vice President Kamala Harris after lately backing out, holding a prolonged information convention Thursday during which he taunted his new rival, boasted of his crowd on Jan. 6, 2021, and lashed out at questions concerning the enthusiasm her marketing campaign has been producing.

Watch Trump’s remarks in our participant above.

Because the Republican presidential nominee addressed reporters at his Palm Seashore, Florida, property, ABC introduced that Trump and Harris, the Democratic nominee, have agreed to a Sept. 10 debate, organising a extensively anticipated faceoff in an already unparalleled election. Trump mentioned he had proposed three debates with three tv networks in September.

Trump once more insisted there had been a “peaceable switch” of energy in 2021 and renewed assaults on Republican rivals like Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, whom Trump has harshly criticized since Kemp refused to go together with his false theories of election fraud.

In taking questions from reporters for greater than an hour, Trump tried to attract a distinction with Harris, who has not held a information convention since she grew to become the seemingly Democratic nominee following President Joe Biden’s withdrawal from the race.

One other key second within the election is about

Trump’s choice to go on ABC, days after posting on his social media account that he wouldn’t seem on the community, units up a extremely anticipated second in an election the place Biden’s catastrophic efficiency within the final debate set in movement his withdrawal.

“I believe it’s essential to have debates,” Trump mentioned Thursday. “I sit up for the debates as a result of I believe we’ve to set the file straight.”

A couple of hours after the information convention, Harris wrote on X that she heard Trump “has lastly dedicated” to debate her on ABC on Sept. 10, the date her marketing campaign has lengthy caught to.

“I sit up for it,” she wrote.

READ MORE: Trump and Harris have agreed to a Sept. 10 presidential debate on ABC, community says

Thursday’s occasion was Trump’s first public look since Harris chosen Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her operating mate. Trump known as Walz a “radical left man.”

“Between her and him, there’s by no means been something like this,” Trump mentioned. “There’s definitely by no means been anyone so liberal like these two.”

He repeatedly urged Harris was not clever sufficient to debate him. Harris, for her half, has tried to goad Trump into debating and instructed an viewers in Atlanta lately that if he had something to say about her, he ought to “say it to my face.”

Trump grew visibly perturbed when pressed on Harris’ crowds and newfound Democratic enthusiasm, dismissing a query about his lighter marketing campaign schedule as silly.

Trump says he has not “recalibrated” his marketing campaign regardless of dealing with a brand new opponent, a dynamic some Republican strategists have quietly complained about.

When requested what belongings Harris possessed, Trump mentioned: “She’s a lady. She represents sure teams of individuals.”

Trump has repeatedly — and falsely — accused Harris, the daughter of Jamaican and Indian immigrants, of beforehand downplaying that she is Black.

Trump acknowledges weak point with Black girls

Trump acknowledged some altering patterns together with his new opponent, acknowledging he is probably not as fashionable with Black girls, certainly one of Democrats’ key voting blocs. He expressed plenty of confidence in his assist from Black males.

“It may very well be I’ll be affected considerably with Black females however we’re actually doing nicely,” he mentioned. “And I believe finally they’ll like me higher as a result of I’m going to offer them safety, security and jobs. I’m going to offer them a superb economic system.”

WATCH: After combative interview at NABJ conference, Trump faces new criticism

Trump marketing campaign officers instructed reporters forward of the information convention they imagine Harris is at present having fun with a honeymoon interval they likened to an “out-of-body expertise.”

They argued the basics of the race haven’t modified and the temper of the nation stays bitter, with Individuals pissed off by the state of the economic system, the administration and the nation’s instructions.

They argued that whereas Harris has energized the Democratic base — which Biden had not performed — she won’t be able to win over Republicans or convert independents or the persuadable voters they’re targeted on concentrating on.

Trump’s marketing campaign plans to spend the subsequent three months hammering Harris as “failed, weak and dangerously liberal,” blaming her for each one of many the Biden administration’s unpopular insurance policies and mocking her mannerisms and talking type.

Trump takes questions on abortion

Trump urged abortion is not going to be a significant problem within the marketing campaign and the end result in November.

He insisted that the matter “has turn into a lot much less of a problem” because the Supreme Court docket ended the federal constitutional proper to abortion companies and returned management of the matter to state governments. However the problem is extensively seen as a common election legal responsibility, and Trump named states similar to Ohio and Kansas which have since voted to guard abortion rights.

READ MORE: 24 issues Donald Trump is promising to do

Trump additionally mentioned he anticipated Florida “will go in somewhat extra liberal means than folks thought” when it votes to repeal an abortion ban later this yr, however he didn’t reply to questions asking how he would vote.

Trump argued that Democrats, Republicans and “everyone” are happy with the outcomes of the 2022 ruling that overturned the 1973 Roe v. Wade choice.

Trump’s actions inside the GOP, nonetheless, counsel he is aware of that Democrats have already got capitalized on Republican opposition to abortion rights and will accomplish that once more this fall. Trump single-handedly ensured that the Republican Social gathering platform adopted on the 2024 conference in Milwaukee doesn’t name for a nationwide ban on abortion, and he has mentioned repeatedly that hardliners within the celebration may price the GOP in November.

The courtroom’s choice, issued months forward of the 2022 midterm elections, is extensively cited as a cause that Democrats fared significantly better than anticipated in Home and Senate contests. And Democrats have hammered Trump in paid ads blaming him and the justices he appointed for ending Roe.

Trump once more makes false claims on Jan. 6

Donald Trump falsely claimed through the press convention that “no person was killed on Jan. 6,” the date in 2021 when pro-Trump rioters breached the U.S. Capitol amid Congress’ effort to certify Biden’s 2020 election victory after Trump refused to concede.

Ashli Babbitt, a 35-year-old Air Drive veteran from San Diego was shot and killed by a police officer as she climbed by a damaged a part of a Capitol door through the violent riot that breached the constructing.

To make certain, Trump has usually cited Babbitt’s dying whereas lamenting the remedy of those that first attended a rally exterior the White Home that day, then marched to the Capitol, a lot of whom fought with police and entered the the constructing.

WATCH: Key takeaways from Homeland Safety watchdog’s report on Secret Service’s Jan. 6 actions

“I believe these folks had been handled very badly. If you examine it to different issues that passed off on this nation the place lots of people had been killed,” Trump mentioned Thursday, including “no person was killed on Jan. 6.”

He additionally falsely claimed extra folks attended his speech at a “Cease the Steal” rally earlier than the riot than the well-known March on Washington in 1963, the long-lasting occasion at which Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. gave his “I Have a Dream” speech.

Trump was requested about Biden’s feedback in a CBS interview that he was “not assured” there could be a peaceable switch of energy if Trump had been to lose.

“He ought to have introduced this up on the debate if he had an issue. In fact there’ll be a peaceable switch, and there was final time.”

Whereas Biden was inaugurated on schedule, Washington was on lockdown that day, with the streets patrolled by navy personnel and home police two weeks after Trump’s supporters had attacked the Capitol.

Related Press author Will Weissert in Washington contributed to this report.