2020 Presidential Debate Will Be In Cleveland

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- The first 2020 presidential debate will take place in Cleveland, hosted by Case Western Reserve University and the Cleveland Clinic.

The partnership stepped in after the University of Notre Dame withdrew from hosting the Sept. 29 debate because of “the complexities COVID-19 created for its fall semester,” according to a press release. The debate will take place at the Sheila and Eric Samson Pavilion, part of the Health Education Campus.

The 477,000-square-foot pavilion is a collaborative learning space for students from CWRU’s nursing, dental and medical schools. The joint project between the university and the Cleveland Clinic opened in the summer of 2019.

The Cleveland Clinic has served as the health security adviser for the Commission on Presidential Debates on all of the fall’s debates.

“Case Western Reserve also is deep in COVID-19 preparations, but the partnership with Cleveland Clinic – and the (health education campus’s) distance from the university’s main campus – made co-hosting more feasible,” the release reads.

Though specifics on how organizers will mitigate the risk of the coronavirus pandemic during the event were not released on Monday, the hospital will control audience size, distance between seats and sanitation.

Whether or not there might be an audience for the debate “will depend on the status of the pandemic as the event moves closer.”