Trump says he may seek conditions for debates

Donald Trump says he wants to debate Hillary Clinton, but may seek to change the rules set by a bipartisan commission.

“I will absolutely do three debates,” Trump told TIME magazine. “I want to debate very badly. But I have to see the conditions.”

That includes the identity of the moderators, he said, who have yet to be named.

“I’ll have to see who the moderators are," Trump told the magazine Tuesday. "Yeah, I would say that certain moderators would be unacceptable, absolutely."

Trump also pointed out that he changed rules for Republican primary debates.

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“I renegotiated the debates in the primaries, remember?" Trump said. "They were making a fortune on them and they had us in for three-and-a-half hours, and I said that’s ridiculous."

"I’m sure they’ll be open to any suggestions I have, because I think they’ll be very fair suggestions," the GOP presidential nominee added.

The debate schedule — which was first announced by the Commission on Presidential Debates last September — sets the first presidential debate for Sept. 26 at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y. (the original site was Dayton, Ohio, but Wright State University announced in July it was withdrawing). Subsequent presidential debates will be held on Oct. 9 in St Louis and Oct. 19 in Las Vegas, with a vice presidential debate set for Oct. 4 in Farmville, Va.

2016 general election debate schedule

On Monday, Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta said in a statement that Clinton, the Democratic presidential nominee, accepted the debates that had been scheduled by the commission.

"With so much at stake in the fall elections, she believes these debates will provide the American people with an important opportunity to hear from the candidates on issues critical to the country's future," Podesta said.

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