Donald Trump, Biden to accept their nominations remotely due to Covid-19 | World News - Hindustan Times
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Donald Trump, Biden to accept their nominations remotely due to Covid-19

Hindustan Times, Washington | ByYashwant Raj
Aug 05, 2020 10:05 PM IST

President Donald Trump and his presumptive Democratic challenger for the White House, Joe Biden, will accept their respective party nominations in speeches delivered remotely, in a major break from tradition as 2020 campaigns and candidates seek new ways to get around the Covid-19 epidemic.

President Donald Trump and his presumptive Democratic challenger for the White House, Joe Biden, will accept their respective party nominations in speeches delivered remotely, in a major break from tradition as 2020 campaigns and candidates seek new ways to get around the Covid-19 epidemic.

US President Donald Trump(Reuters photo)
US President Donald Trump(Reuters photo)

“I’ll probably do mine live from the White House,” President Trump said Wednesday on Fox News, hours after reports emerged Republicans could be considering the White House.“It’s easy and I think it’s a beautiful setting, and we are thinking about that. … It’s the easiest alternative,” he added.

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The Democratic National Convention said shortly after in a statement that Biden “will no longer travel to Milwaukee (venue of a pared down convention) and will instead address the nation and accept the Democratic nomination from his home state of Delaware”. Further details will be announced later.

Candidates have traditionally accepted the nomination at lavishly mounted conventions that last three to four days. But in view of surging Covid-19 cases, both Trump and Biden have had to overhaul their plans, as have all others running for US House of Representatives, the Senate and state elections.

Trump cancelled plans last month to hold the convention with the usual pomp and fanfare in Jacksonville, Florida after the state saw a surge in Covid-19 infections with the potential of continuing through till the convention slated for August 24-27. A limited version will be held in Charlottesville, North Carolina.

US president have traditionally avoided the use of the White House and other federal facilities for overtly political purposes, but Trump will cross no legal lines if he did indeed deliver the acceptance speech from the White House as he has indicated, experts and pundits have said.

Democrats took the first step in the direction of an unconventional convention when they announced in June that Joe Biden, the presumptive nominee, will accept the nomination at a pared down convention in Wisconsin. He will be physically there, but delegates and all others will attend remotely.

Few other details have been made available of the conventions that will be followed by three presidential debates between Trump and Biden on September 29 and October 15 and 22. The Trump camp is pushing for a fourth, insinuating, at the same time, that former vice-president is trying to duck debates.

At their conventions, two parties will declare their respective manifestoes, called platforms, which would lay out their agenda. Republican are going with their 2016 platform, as is.

Democrats released a draft last month, which was a bridge-building exercise between the campaign and Bernie Sanders-led progressives of the party. Though still be finalized, it has also retained substantial portions from the 2026 platform adopted by Hillary Clinton, the nominee then.

On India, for instance, it’s almost the same one-line construct: “And we will continue to invest in our strategic partnership with India — the world’s largest democracy, a nation of great diversity, and a growing Asia-Pacific power.”

In 2016, the platform had this on India: “We will continue to invest in a long-term strategic partnership with India—the world’s largest democracy, a nation of great diversity, and an important Pacific power.”

Democrats helping the Biden campaign have said the former vice-president is far more engaged on India than it may seem from the perfunctory one sentence in the draft platform.

Biden has spoken more expansively of his views on India and said recently that the US and India are “natural partners” and the bilateral relationship will be a “high priority” for his administration if elected. He has also said he will overturn the freeze on H-1B visas, a key issue for India.

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