Donald Trump on Wednesday turned down an invite from Fox News to debate Kamala Harris in late October. There will be no rematch! he wrote on Truth Social .

The former president mostly considers Fox News friendly territory and often treats it as a public relations arm for his messaging. He had pushed for a debate on the conservative channel previously.

So his flat-out rejection, even if he did say he would not debate Harris again after his disastrous performance in their first showdown, was somewhat surprising.

The network offered a debate in Pennsylvania on Oct. 24 or Oct. 27, saying in a statement it would present an opportunity for each candidate to make their closing arguments . Martha MacCallum and Bret Baier were proposed as the moderators.

But hours later, on Truth Social , Trump offered a litany of excuses for saying no.

He said it was very late in the process. He said he had agreed to a Fox News debate in early September, but Harris refused. (At the time, both candidates had already agreed to a Sept. 10 debate on ABC News). He dubiously claimed he beat her the first time around, even though Harris was broadly viewed as the winner. He wrote he had a lead in the polls that was getting bigger by the day. And then, jumping on a comment Harris made on The View that has been amplified by conservatives, he wrote that his opponent said, She would not do anything different than Joe Biden , so there is nothing to debate.

CNN had also proposed a late-October debate that Harris accepted, but Trump has spurned her calls, the network said. CNNs deadline for a formal response from the two was set to expire at noon on Thursday.

The Harris campaign did not immediately return HuffPosts request for comment.