The Election is Rigged (I'm Going To Lose)

[Esquilax]

Having said that, I do wonder what will happen if Trump skips the debates. Would it hurt him less than if he actually debated (I think Clinton would destroy him on the debate stage)? Or would it hurt him more, as it would be see by most as chickening out.

Trump's big sell for the presidency has been predicated on being the biggest, strongest, winningest guy for the job, who'll protect us all from mean brown people and political correctness. Skipping the debates- when his opponent is a woman!- will not go down well with even a certain section of his voting bloc, the ones who actually believe the strongman narrative. His core supporters, for whom that narrative is largely window dressing for the bigotries Trump really embodies, and who are largely just as much paper tigers as Trump himself, will not be swayed by that, but there will be some who will question it.

None of them, incidentally, would be swayed by him actually going to the debates, I don't think. Remember, these are people who watched his performance during the primaries, the debates he held there and the way he's conducted himself generally, and came away thinking "there's my guy!" At this point, no amount of intellectual ass whooping will influence them away from him, because intelligence in the forms debates are most apt to demonstrate, is not something that bloc values.