[Source: Reuters]

Democratic President Joe Biden and his Republican rival Donald Trump take the stage on Thursday night for a debate that will offer voters a rare side-by-side look at the two oldest candidates ever to seek the U.S. presidency.

Biden, 81, and Trump, 78, will be under pressure to display their command of issues and avoid verbal stumbles as they seek a breakout moment in a race that opinion polls show has been deadlocked for months.

The 90-minute televised debate, the first between a sitting president and a former one, will air at 9 p.m. ET (0100 GMT on Friday) on CNN and takes place far earlier than normal – more than four months before the Nov. 5 Election Day.

It comes at a moment of profound polarization and deep-seated anxiety among voters about the state of American politics. Two-thirds of voters said in a May Reuters/Ipsos poll that they were concerned violence could follow the election, nearly four years after a mob of Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol.

Trump will take the stage as a felon who still faces a trio of criminal cases, including to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election. The former president, who continues to falsely claim that his defeat was the result of fraud and has suggested he will punish his political enemies if returned to power, will need to convince undecided voters that he does not pose a mortal threat to democracy, as Biden asserts.

Biden arrived in Atlanta on Thursday afternoon under intense pressure to deliver a forceful performance after months of Republican assertions his faculties have dulled with age.

Ahead of the debate, the Biden campaign released a video featuring former Trump aides saying they would not support him this time. “Take it from the people who know Donald Trump best – he is unfit to be president,” Biden said on X.

Biden advisers say he will emphasize Trump’s role in threatening abortion access, portray him as a danger to democratic norms and remind voters of Trump’s often chaotic 2017-2021 term in office.

Trump will focus on the high levels of inflation and record numbers of migrants who have entered the country illegally under Biden’s watch, and will also question his world leadership at a time of war in Gaza and Ukraine, Trump advisers said.

Trump, whose plane landed in Georgia about 3-1/2 hours before the debate, posted on social media what appeared to be advice from a former member of his administration about how to respond to attacks on his environmental record. The notes from former Environmental Protection Agency chief Andrew Wheeler urged Trump to say he will lower carbon dioxide emissions and encourage domestic energy production.

A campaign spokesman said the post was not a mistake. “The Biden team has been previewing their attacks — albeit moronic attacks — all week,” spokesman Stephen Cheung said.