Professor Pruitt Talks to Portuguese Newspaper About U.S. Presidential Debate

Professor Lisa Pruitt spoke to reporter Catarina Maldonado Vasconcelos for an Aug. 28 story in Portugal’s Expresso newspaper (English translation here)  about the Sept. 10 U.S. presidential debate, specifically the matter of whether candidates’ microphones would be live when not answering questions.

The teams behind Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris and former President and GOP candidate Donald Trump reportedly had reached an impasse on the issue, with Harris’ team preferring the microphones stay on.

Pruitt told Expresso that Harris likely was confident enough in her debating skills to believe she could hold her own if Trump interrupted her during the debate. 

By Sept. 5, the Harris campaign had agreed to debate host ABC News’ muted-microphone rules.

Distinguished Professor of Law Lisa R. Pruitt is a scholar whose recent work explores the legal relevance of rural spatiality, including how it inflects dimensions of gender, race, and ethnicity. Pruitt's work also considers rural-urban difference in transnational and international contexts. She is the recipient of the law school’s 2020 Distinguished Teaching Award.