Tonight's debate will determine many factors for the presidential candidate, if President Barack Obama can rebound following his disappointing performance from the first debate and it Republican candidate Mitt Romney can maintain the lead in several polls and approach to undecided voters.
For the second debate, it will follow a town hall meeting format where approximately 80 undecided voters will gather at Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York and at least 12 will get to ask the candidates a question based on the provided theme of domestic and foreign policy.
The 90-minute debate will be moderated by CNN's Chief Political Correspondent Candy Crowley.
Crowley, also anchor of CNN's State of the Union, has been referred to a fair journalist but has come under fire by both Obama and Romney campaigns on her approach to the debate.
As Latinos Post reported, Crowley has stated she does intend to ask follow up questions, when needed, after the following the undecided voter asks their question to the candidates.
The two campaigns were not too elated and stated it conflicts with the policies set by the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD), the organizers of the presidential debates.
According to the CPD, the debate format will be as follows: "Candidates each will have two minutes to respond [to the undecided voter's question], and an additional minute for the moderator to facilitate a discussion."
The undecided voters have been selected by the Gallup Organization.
Both campaigns have promoted their candidates ahead of the 9 p.m. start time.
Senior Adviser to the Obama Campaign Robert Gibbs appeared on MSNBC's Morning Joe and said, "You're going to see an exceptionally strong debate performance from the president. He'll be energetic."
Gibbs added that Obama will talk about the progress made in during his first term as president but also on what's planned for the next four years to "move our country and economy forward, strengthening it for the middle class."
The Huffington Post reported on what's at stake for Romney.
"The best outcome from his first debate is that he gave the conservative commentariat, finally, something to believe in after a summer in which they were some of Romney's loudest critics."
The Post added that Romney should deliver the same style as the first debate.
Tonight's debate is the penultimate debate of the 2012 presidential election season. The third and final debate will be next Mon., Oct. 22 from Boca Raton, Florida and will return to a similar format as the first debate. The final debate will be moderated by CBS News' Bob Schieffer, who has confirmed the topics for the last debate and can be found here.
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