Between donald trump and hillary diverting our entire program to your calls, tweets and facebook comments. Join the conversation tomorrow beginning at 7 a. M. Eastern here on cspan. Good evening, you are looking at live pictures from Washington University in st. Louis. Hillary clinton and donald trump will faceoff for the second time in the 2016 cycle. Tonight in a town hall style debate. It will become a critical event for the Trump Campaign. Lets take a look inside the debate venue tonight, which looks very different from the. Irst president ial matchup mrs. Clinton and mr. Trump will be in this town hall style which looks like a theater. Thele selected by organization, who are undecided voters will be questioning them. Supporters of the two campaigns will be watching in that theater in the round style. Lets hear more about that. Format also includes two moderators. Anderson cooper a cnn and Martha Raddatz. They are able to ask their own questions, in addition to those from the audience. For the next hour we will take you inside that room or do will talk politics, show you what it is like in there in the lead up to the debate, and learn more about the format. I were first guest of the evening joins us from inside of the debate hall. A senior politics writer u. S. News and world report. Anybody who is watching us on aspan, has been watching Pretty Amazing past two days since fridays leaks of mr. Trump. Watching the punches and counter punches on social media, seeing statements from politicians about their support. What can you tell us that is new as of this afternoon . Think it is safe to say that the Trump Campaign remains in a state of crisis going into this debate. I have spoken to a Trump Campaign aide within the last hour. He described the situation inside the campaign with two words, he said disarray and trepidation. Disarray is republicans who have abandoned donald trump in the last 24 hours. More than a dozen senators, at least for governors have denounced him. You are really seeing the institutional walls for the Republican Party caving in on their own nominee with 30 days remaining. That is problematic, to say the least, for trump. Trepidation on what is next. What kind of donald trump will we see tonight . Will he be remorseful for the things he has said . He be baited by Hillary Clinton into going on the attack and raising some of the issues that her own husband has had in the past. Before these tapes were leaks, trump said he wanted the debate to be focused on issues and policies. He did not want to bring up former president clintons infidelities and own indiscretions that women have lobbed against him. Donald trump is in a completely race. Ent place in this he has people coming at him at all sides. Republicans abandoning him and democrats on the attack. The big question is what donald trump will we see tonight over a 90 minute town hall. A few polls have been conducted. Here is one of them. Itico, the question is should donald trump drop out of the race . Democrats pulls that yes, only 12 of the republicans. You what an interesting situation that creates for that republican in fact icial if how did they maneuver between people in their own party and their need to appeal to those broader votere basis going to the polls . This is something that has dogged republican elected officials throughout this campaign. Every time donald trump said something controversial, you would go to senator kelly ayotte , both facing reelection, how do you respond to this . You denounced this. What we have found is this have been the breaking point for many of the senators. Kelly ayotte repeatedly tries to distance yourself from donald trump. Also, saying that she would has renouncedd him. You have seen other governors and senators walked away from donald trump. You have other senators up for reelection white, senator marco rubio who has denounced trumps comments, but has not gone as far as to say he cannot support him. You are seeing a fault line in the Republican Party. Never have we seen in event in ,his long, unpredictable unwieldy campaign. We have never seen an event were so many republicans have abandoned him. I think there will be some repercussions in some of the Republican Base is more important to that candidate. We know that the representative of nevada said that he could no longer support mr. Trump, and s in that some boo crowd. If you distance yourself from donald trump, you are distancing yourself from his very passionate supporters. Supporters have come out in the thousands to see him speak. If you remain supportive of donald trump, you alienate the , the small sliver that becomes very important in these. Lose races the moderate voters that are distraught and dismayed by his comments. Heard that there will be a telephone call with the members of the House Republican conference tomorrow. Do you know anything more about them all watching the debate tomorrow and discussing strategy . Do we know anymore more about what is to be accomplished . Anything moreow about that specific call. I can tell you that there has been many frantic calls coming out from the Trump Campaign, to members of congress, to senators, to governors to try to keep people on board. They are trying to say watch the debate before you make a final decision. Whats how he handles himself for 90 minutes on a stage with Hillary Clinton before you abandon ship. I know from inside the Trump Campaign, donald trump is getting frustrated with ryan previous, who has abandon a lot shows. He did not appear, that was a sign that he could be abandoning trump and that he is basically giving up on him. They had tough private conversations. He was the chairman of the party. That is very tough to try to win an election 30 days out. There will be a lot of things i have to go on, even after the debate, assuring house members, governors, and every root every republican needs to be ,eassured to stay on the ship as it is really in crisis. I think republicans fear they do not know what else is out there. There have been some reports that there will be more hate of mr. Trump saying worse things. That could make this a very difficult situation, even worse for him. This is hourbyhour for the Trump Campaign on trying to keep people together, trying to stop to affection at all levels. I think that call will be important. It is many calls that they will be having to make to try to keep this thing together. The Clinton Campaign also had his own events with the wiki leaks documents coming out, that suggest she is speaking in one voice publicly and another voice privately in regards to wall street and trade. If this had been at a different time, it may have gotten a little bit more attention. Let me ask you, what does this do in positioning her with the Bernie Sanders supporters . Problemundercuts the that the Bernie Sanders and frankly a lot of americans have had a problem with her, that she says one thing and says another. That she is untrustworthy. Absolutelyeaks differently to a public audience. I think one of the most damaging she said she is for open borders, which is something her campaign had denied. Political political facts not true. It was now we have it any transcript. The Clinton Campaign has not documentsut if these are real or not. They will not confirm the authenticity of these documents, but clearly this is devastating. This will be this would be much more devastating if there were not these trump tapes out there setting up all of the media oxygen. I think Hillary Clinton will have to face questions about the wikileaks disclosure tonight, but her answer may be overwhelmed by whatever donald trump have to say about his own controversy right now, regarding the tapes. Host lets talk for a moment about the format and opportunities for both candidates tonight. Certainly to some degree you can probably predict questions that might come from the panel of reporters. Tonight they will be also facing people in the audience who are able to ask the right questions without coaching. Who is best at this kind of format between the two of them . Providesk it really challenges for both of them. Donald trump really did not do a withf Campaign Events small intimate gatherings. He would not go into the diner and top with people. He would not do oneonone or small group events. He loves the week massive in aes with 10,000 people stadium. That is where he gets his energy, that is what he is best that. This is a new experience for him and it has added pressure given the controversy over the last 48 hours. , it is not her strong suit. Shehas done more of this, has taken questions, but a lot of times they are scripted. They are handpicked from supporters. These will be undecided supporters. Direct toughvery questions about her policy decisions in the past, about her emails, i think some of those same questions could come up tonight. I think her showing empathy, her showing compassion, her showing authenticity is something that will be a challenge for her. There is a different level of pressure on her, and donald trump, given what donald trump has gone through the last 48 hours. I think all eyes will be on what trump says, even more so than Hillary Clinton. Camera inave a live the media filing center, which we have done for each of the debate so far. Often it is customary for people representing the campaign spingates to come out and the news media about their candidates performance. What do you think the room will be like tonight . It is always fun. Remember last time in the debate, donald trump came through the spin room. That is something that usually. Oes not happen president ial candidates go to their corners after the debate, but donald trump walked into the spin room and that was obviously chaotic because you had reporters from all around the world caving in on him immediately. If you does that again, that will be dramatic. Hillary clinton has not done that and is not expected to do that tonight. Ift has high in electricity a candidate walks into the room. Obviously, both campaigns will have their surrogates out there. They will have senators that are supporting them. Prominent democrats and some just and republicans will try to refrain what happens in this room, and try to spin it so that they can frame the stories to be more positive for their site. Writerenior political for u. S. News, thank you so much for starting off our night in st. Louis. Thank you. Little bit learn a more about the format for tonights townhall. Sections. Really two the first is citizens participants closing sections during the first half. These are undecided voters who had been selected iv organization. The moderator will be asking questions in parts of issues trending in social media. Organizations have been soliciting questions on their social media pages for the past several days. That will help to frame some of the trending issues in social media. Candidates will each have two minutes to respond to the question, then the moderator has one additional minute to further facilitate the question. That is what the town hall will look to. Look like. We had an opportunity to take a look at this stage, which it looks very different from the first president ial matchup. You will learn more about how tonight stage was put together. This is your perch, where are we . We are at the production table where all of the production for tonights debate will be managed by the executive producer, his coexecutive producer, our timer, i will be appeared, and over mice sold shouldermy soldier you are looking at the time. Producer will be in there in your years giving them direction about timing. He has a very light hand. He will basically be reminding them of where we are in the progression of the show. This looks like a far more complicated production, how so . There are a lot of moving parts to town meetings. We will have 40 uncommitted voters from the st. Louis area who are here asking questions of the candidates the moderators will also be in question from technology and social media, reflecting peoples deep interest about topics that have not been covered yet. Go to the main stage, what is happening here in terms of communication with the moderators, and trying to make sure you are keeping track of the social media trends. Keeping track be of those here, this is done before the debate. There is nothing in realtime. The moderators have been checking social media and. Ollowing the first debate plus, technologybased research to see what are the topics people are hoping to hear about tonight. A proxy forlogy as the citizens who are not on the stage, they will also be asking questions. This is a way of bringing in a larger group of responses. Lets go down to the main stage. We are here on the main stage, a new look for the commission this year. We have refurbished the set. The eagle remains the same but is out of a different fabric. Everything is much lighter and more technologically advanced. Particularly for High Definition television. It is based on the traditional look, it is a different version of it. We start back there with the eagle and move around to the chairs for the citizen participants. This is a smaller number than we have ever had before. As you can see, they are surrounding the candidates who positions right here. They can move around and they are looking behind us at the two moderators who have their headquarters. A great, intimate feel to it and should make for a hopey interesting, and i somewhat spontaneous examination of the questions that citizens have, as well as the ones the moderators will be asking from social media. No podium, the candidates will have a podium and a bar stool. What can they have on the table . A they can write notes, it is writing surface. Is waterh, there glasses. It is functional and there to give them a writing surface. How does the candidate know where he or she could move . We remember back with george w. Bush. When we do the rehearsal we easy and there is an good shot of them, as opposed to getting the back of their head. Or if they are walking in front of a camera shot. We do that to make sure the candidates are seen clearly and that town meeting persistent prince participants. Cameras this is almost like theater grade you want a lot of cameras so you can make sure you have a clean and unimpeded shot of all of the participants. Two moderators, the candidates and the citizen participants. You make sure that the citizens are not nervous . That they are comfortable russian mark comfortable . They are understandably nervous, i would be. Date we were her sweat they will be doing. They are very generous to do this, but tv is not what these people do on a daily basis. We want to make sure that when they come out they feel very comfortable with the set, how it will work and what will transpire. How they get a microphone, stand up and not have their needs knocking so hard. Anderson cooper and Martha Raddatz will be here. What will they see question mark see . They will be seated they will be looking at the citizens and facilitating the conversation. We havean experiment, not done this before. Especially blending social media and technologybased questions. There is a lot for them to facilitate. I have total confidence that they will figure out how to do this and a way that is really substantive, novel and productive for the home audience. The social media component again, is it what is trending on social media sites . What is trending, we are not using individual questions. It is a good time to understand a macro level. What are the issues people have not heard about yet. It is not about one specific question, it is about what are the things that most people are expressing concerns about the have not been touched on. , oninally, behind the stage debate night tonight, what is it like behindthescenes . Live 90 Minute Program with no commercial breaks. Our Network Partners are focused on having everything as accurate, high quality and. Lexible as we can it is a Real Partnership in every sense. There is a lot of attention and a lot of people on their toes. How does this all feel to you . It always feels exciting. I am so proud of our crew. This is normally an athletic facility. Look around you out what has been built and put together, lot offunctional, a different backup systems and it will be used for an audience that exceeds anything. It is very exciting and i am so honored to be affiliated with the people who made this happen. They are the best, they are the Gold Standard. We have said it before and we are very grateful to be here. Janet brown, thank you. Host that is janet brown who has been the executive director since it was formed in 1987. Very gracious with her time. We are looking at live pictures from within the debate hall in st. Louis. In just a minute you will mean a member of the Debate Commission and learn more about how the format of town hall has changed over the years. First a bit of news that donald trump has held a Surprise Panel broadcast live to facebook. It is just 90 minutes before he begins tonights debate. If there is any direction about which direction he will take in his counterpunch for the last tople of days, that seems give us more indication. We will tell you more about that our previewutes as program continues. Let me introduce you to reverend john jenkins who is a board member of the commission of president ial debates. We are taking quite a lead of the news i have given you with donald trump. He is the president of notre dame university. How many years have you been involved with the Debate Commission . I became in false in 2012 with that cycle, and have been on since that time. Host what can you tell us about how the commission operates and you are a member of a commission that works on formats. How did your committee do its work for tonights townhall . Guest just to correct you i am on the committee that works on the qualifies and who who does not. I do know about the format committee, it is a committee. Let me just say, it is an honor to be on the commiss