Political debates have long been one of the defining events of an election.
But they're becoming less common, particularly in high-profile races.
In Florida, so far this year, no debates are scheduled in any of the statewide general election races. David Jolly and Byron Donalds aren't set to debate in the governor's race, and Senator Ashley Moody has declined to debate Democratic challenger Angie Nixon.
And Donalds declined to participate in Florida's Republican gubernatorial primary debate this year.
That follows a pattern emerging at the national level, too. Donald Trump skipped the Republican presidential primary debates in 2024.
For most of the television era, the political debate had a pretty straightforward purpose: Put candidates next to each other, take away the script, and let voters watch.
Drew Piers is president of Sachs Media, a public affairs and strategic communications company that has helped previously coordinate statewide debates. He says he thinks they still matter.
“Debates really offer this unique opportunity that is pretty rare to be able to see candidates side by side to be able to have them thrown maybe not a curveball but an opportunity where the quick talking point often doesn't satisfy the moderator. You're being forced to go a little bit deeper to explain your position to be confronted with facts or your record on a particular issue, and that's something that's rare.”
But with the rise of social media, campaigns now have a lot more avenues to highlight their candidate without putting them across the stage from an opponent.
Piers says campaigns are increasingly producing informal video from the trail, a candidate at a restaurant, a barber shop, or a small business.
“Those off the cuff moments can be captured pretty quickly with just something as simple as an iPhone and you're able to really be able to get that live in a matter of minutes rather than a matter of days, and you're able to do it in a much more cost-effective way," he said.
And those videos don't have to reach voters through a television station. Campaigns can put them directly into social media feeds.
That creates a different calculation around debates, says Jackson McMillian, a Florida political consultant whose company Key Lime Strategies focuses on digital campaign fundraising.
“The vast majority of Americans report, based on polling over the last couple of years, that less and less are they willing to change their minds. We're becoming more tribalistic as a country," he said.
To McMillian, the main audience for full televised debates isn't undecided voters, it's people who care a lot about politics and already have their opinions. He thinks debates are a strong way to energize a campaign's base.
“I think it's very much an insider baseball thing where you get to, you know, you get to score points, but then that doesn't really influence, you know, the greater population. It's only going to influence insiders and motivate them or demotivate them, but you're not changing anybody's minds,” he said.
That makes the risk different for a candidate who's ahead or in a competitive race. Piers says debates can produce what he calls a “shakeup moment.” One example he gave was former President Joe Biden's debate performance against Trump during the 2024 elections. After the debate, Biden dropped out.
“If you're the candidate who is running ahead, you know you're looking at the political calculus of whether or not you should debate what the format should that of that debate should be, and you're probably going to be a bit more cautious, a bit more guarded in what you're what you're sharing," he said.
A candidate who's behind has a reason to want that moment.
McMillian says that's why the candidates most aggressively calling for debates are often the ones with less money or name recognition.
“If your campaign can't afford to go on TV, if your press releases aren't being picked up and you're not being invited on cable news, of course you're going to want to debate, right? Because that's free cable news coverage that you wouldn't get otherwise. That's free eyeballs.”But there's another wrinkle.
Even when campaigns do participate in debates, they're no longer thinking only about the people watching the whole event.
Piers says campaigns are now preparing for a second audience: people who will encounter a debate as a clip on social media.
“There's the audience of viewers who are really focused on politics, who are probably going to watch a 60-minute debate through and through from start to finish, and then increasingly there's the bigger audience, the audience that is going to take, or maybe you're having the campaign team take a portion of that debate, 30 seconds, 60 seconds, sometimes even 15 seconds of it — and slice and dice that up and throw it onto social media," he said.
So, the debate hasn't necessarily become irrelevant. But the campaigns now have an alternative: produce their own videos, control the message, and distribute them directly to consumers on social media instead of going through journalistic institutions.
McMillian says that allows candidates to appear authentic to audiences who don't just consume political stuff. But there's a catch.
“The biggest concern is that it's not ending up in front of the people they want it to, and this has been something, I've been raising the alarm on for some time, the algorithms are putting it in front of people who were already going to vote for you, so why are we spending all this? Social media is important, don't get me wrong, but like especially in this day and age, your social media should be more focused on partnerships with existing creators than building up your own follower account," he said.
Piers still sees debates as important a vital for democracy.
“The debates are not going away. They might change in the way that they look, and every debate has a slightly different format. But the reality is they play such an important role in civic education and letting voters know who they're voting for," he said.
