When Vice President Kamala Harris and former  chairman Donald Trump meet Tuesday night in Philadelphia, they will have taken dramatically different approaches to preparing for the first — and likely only — presidential debate between the two  campaigners.

Harris spent  utmost of the  once four days ensconced in Pittsburgh’s Omni William Penn Hotel for an  ferocious “ debate camp. ” Her  helpers created a mock setup to mimic the layout of the debate plant; cast a  stager Donald Trump stand- in to unleash harsh attacks and  obnoxious  commentary; and put the vice  chairman through hours of rehearsed questions.

About 330  long hauls to the east, Trump spent  important of the weekend at his golf club in Bedminster, N.J.,  concluding for “ policy sessions ” with  helpers and abettors   rather of traditional practice runs. The former  chairman has  shared in about a half- dozen of the sessions in recent weeks, reviewing Harris’s policy record from her 2020 presidential  crusade and  rehearsing how to respond to an anticipated  shower of attacks on his character.

And yet for all the attacks they've changed, Harris and Trump have  noway  met. The event is likely to draw the largest  followership for either  seeker before November, and both sides agree that the  sweepstakes , hosted by ABC News, carries surprisingly high stakes, given the  crusade’s compressed  schedule and the fact that  pates show it's basically tied. 

The  former presidential debate, in June, dramatically reshaped the  crusade when President Joe Biden stumbled over his words,  floundering at times to complete  rulings and landing many attacks on Trump. The performance aggravated long- standing  enterprises about Biden’s age,  ultimately leading him to abandon his reelection  crusade and  plump  Harris.

This time, Trump will face an opponent who's anticipated to be far more  redoubtable on the debate stage and is intent on creating a  discrepancy not only with Biden but with Trump’s  frequently- rambling appearances. A former prosecutor who  smoothed her  public profile in Senate  sounds by aggressively questioning Trump  nominees, Harris planned to emplace the same tactics on Tuesday, firing back at any questionable  reflections by Trump and trying to fact- check him in real time.

Those plans have hit a  hitch of  feathers. Harris’s  helpers wanted ABC to change the debate rules so both microphones would remain unmuted throughout the debate, hoping that would encourage Trump to go  hectically  out- script and let Harris issue sharp retorts. Trump  gestured a  amenability to unmute the mics, but his  helpers were determined to keep the rules in place, telling the former  chairman that Harris’s  platoon was trying to set him up.

Harris  helpers  sweat Trump will unleash so  numerous dubious statements or attacks during his  continued speaking time that she'll be  unfit to challenge them all, according to people familiar with her planning, who spoke on the condition of  obscurity to  bandy internal strategy. After losing the fight on the microphones, Harris  helpers spent the weekend revising their strategy, hoping she'll find other ways to turn Trump’s attacks, the people said.

Harris’s  helpers say she's prepared for whatever  interpretation of Trump shows up Tuesday, although given the rules, they anticipate the former  chairman to be  fairly  chastened and perform  important as he did against Biden in June.

Some Harris abettors   intimately concede that the fracas over the microphones was part of an  trouble to lower  prospects for the vice  chairman’s performance,  stewing that too  numerous Egalitarians and swing choosers anticipate Harris to  annihilate Trump onstage. Harris’s  crusade has  constantly noted that Tuesday will be Trump’s seventh presidential debate.

“ We anticipate Donald Trump will be ready for the debate, ” Kevin Munoz, a  spokesperson for the Harris  crusade, said in a statement. “ He's a showman who won his most recent debate back in June, and we know he has been  rehearsing indeed more and preparing harder than ever  ahead. ”

He added “ The Vice President will come to the debate prepared to partake her vision for a new way forward for our country that turns the  runner on the  history, and we believe it'll  solidify for the American people what's at stake in this election. ”

One concession that Harris’s  crusade won ABC News has assigned a patron to cover each  seeker during  marketable breaks, especially if they leave the stage, to  insure no  helpers pass them notes or try to communicate with them, according to a person familiar with the arrangement.

Trump’s camp, for its part, tried to raise  prospects for his rival.

“ The high- bar anticipation facing Kamala Harris is that for every new idea put forward, Harris has to explain both the damage she’s done to our frugality as the sitting Vice President, as well as answer why she has n’t  enforced any of these new plans during the last 3 ½ times, ” Jason Miller, a  elderly  counsel to Trump, said in a statement.

“ farther complicating matters is that Harris’ new Obama  crusade  counsels have told her to hide from the press for two months, further raising  prospects for the choosers, ” Miller added. “ The one thing we do know,  still, is that Kamala Harris’ values have n't changed, and we will be educating the American public as to what that meanspolicy-wise, in great detail. ”

Politicians who have  batted  Trump in the  history say a key to success for Harris will be her capability to avoid taking the former  chairman’s bait on  particular attacks, a mistake Biden made in the June 27 debate when he battered with Trump over their  separate golf games. 

“ Be who you are, ” said former Ohio governor John Kasich, who ran against Trump in the 2016 Democratic primaries. “ Figure out what you want to communicate and communicate it. Do n’t get sidetracked.However, you can point that out, but my sense is getting into a name- calling situation does n’t benefit anybody, If  notoriety’s going to be really rude to you. ”

In his medications, Trump has largely leaned on the same small group of  helpers to help prepare for this debate as he did for the last one Miller, the  elderly  counsel; Rep. Matt Gaetz( R- Fla.); Stephen Miller, a top policy  counsel; and Vince Haley and Ross Worthington, two of his speechwriters.

“ One of the  pretensions is to condition him to those attacks so he does n’t overreact, ” a Trump  counsel said, speaking on the condition of  obscurity to  bandy  nonpublic medications.

Trump’s  helpers have given him reams of accoutrements  as fodder for attacks on Harris’s  former liberal policy positions, including her offer to ban fracking and her support for Medicare- for- all, neither of which Harris still embraces. They've also  collected information on Harris’s record as a prosecutor in San Francisco, bringing up individual cases they  suppose will embarrass her. 

“ We're trying to get her off- script so she'll make a mistake, ” said the Trump  counsel with knowledge of the medications.

Trump has  escaped  rehearsing with  stages, and he does n't like the public perception that he's  rehearsing at  each,  counsels say. rather, he has  frequently used conference tables at his clubs or taken time during aeroplane  breakouts. helpers say the former  chairman views rallies — he held one in Wisconsin on Saturday and interviews as the stylish medication for the debate.

In preparing for Tuesday’s debate, Harris  helpers say they know the vice  chairman still faces the challenge of introducing herself to large swaths of choosers, and they anticipate the viewing  followership Tuesday night to include  numerous choosers who have n't yet made up their mind and might eventually decide the election. There wo n't be a live  followership in the plant. 

Harris’s  crusade appearances so far, including her speech at the Democratic National Convention, were extensively seen as successes by her  counsels, but they said they fete  that an unscripted debate will have a different, potentially more skeptical  followership.

“ We feel good about how the convention introduced her to the country, ” a Harris  supporter said, speaking on the condition of  obscurity to  bandy the medications. “ We understand more target choosers — whether swing choosers or soft implicit nonvoters are going to be watching the debate more  intensively than they did the convention. ”

For that reason, Harris has spent the weekend  concentrated on answers that incorporate her  docket and her  memoir, especially aspects of her life before the vice administration. helpers hope she'll  produce a sharp  discrepancy with Trump on  revocation rights and the frugality.  

Harris  helpers are also planning for the Trump attacks on the liberal positions she  championed in the 2020 Popular primary. While her  crusade has  gestured she has abandoned  numerous of those policy preferences, Harris herself has not always intimately stated as  important,  rather putting out statements through anonymous  helpers.  

Harris’s debate  fix has been led by Karen Dunn, a  stager Washington  counsel who counseled  her for her 2020vice-presidential debate, and Rohini Kosoglu, a longtime policy  counsel. In addition, the  fix sessions have featured Harris’s White House chief of staff, Lorraine Voles, and her  crusade chief of staff, Sheila Nix.

Also on hand have been Tony West, Harris’s family- in- law; Jen O’Malley Dillon, the  crusade  president; David Plouffe, a  elderly  counsel on the  crusade; Brian Fallon and Kirsten Allen, her two top dispatches  helpers; Sean Clegg, a longtime political  counsel courting to her California days; Minyon Moore, a longtime Harris  supporter who chaired the Popular convention in Chicago; and Cedric L. Richmond, a former solon and top White House staffer.

Philippe Reines, a longtime Hillary Clinton  assistant, was  originally enlisted to play Sen. JD Vance( R- Ohio) when Harris was preparing to face him in thevice-presidential debate. Now that Harris has  mounted to the top of the ticket and will face Trump, Reines has stayed on to play the former  chairman, reprising the  part he played for Clinton during her 2016 debate medications. 

 After the debate, the Trump  crusade is planning to bring  further than two dozen abettors  to the spin room, including Gabbard and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who ended his independent  shot for  chairman and  championed Trump, people familiar with the plans said. There are also  conversations about bringing Vance to the spin room.

Harris’s  crusade is planning to have California Gov. Gavin Newsom appear in the spin room, the same  part he played for Biden after the June debate.