By 3 News online staff
Vice-presidential candidates Joe Biden and Paul Ryan are squaring off this afternoon in their only debate of the 2012 United States election campaign.
The ‘veep’ debate is being seen as the Democratic camp’s chance to recover from Barack Obama’s performance against Mitt Romney in the first presidential debate last week.
Despite Obama’s insistence that his rival paid little attention to the truth during their debate, the first presidential showdown has been recorded by many pundits as a victory for the more animated Romney.
While the presidential candidates focused on domestic policy in their first faceoff, both domestic and foreign policy are on the table today for Biden, the 69-year-old incumbent Democratic vice president, and Ryan, a 42-year-old Republican congressman.
The debate is scheduled to last 90 minutes, and is being held at Centre College – a liberal arts school in Danville, Kentucky. Martha Raddatz of ABC News is moderating, and will aim to steer the candidates through nine, 10-minute sections where each candidate will have two minutes to respond to the same question.
Ahead of today's debate, Obama said his number two just needs to be himself.
“Joe just needs to be Joe,” he told ABC News.
Meanwhile, Romney told a town-hall meeting in Mount Vernon, Ohio, this week that he’s confident in Ryan’s chances against the more experienced Biden.
“I think Paul Ryan will do great,” he said.
Watch a live stream of the debate on the link above – starting at 2pm.
3 News