"It would be incumbent upon them to communicate with us and others about what they have in mind," Priebus said. | Getty RNC chairman backs Trump on fall debate schedule

Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus says he's backing Donald Trump on his complaints about the presidential debate schedule.

"Certainly we're not going to agree with anything that our nominee doesn't agree with," Priebus said Sunday on CBS' "Face the Nation."


"It would be incumbent upon them to communicate with us and others about what they have in mind," Priebus added. "But we're not going to be having debates on Saturday and Sunday nights, I don't believe."

Earlier in the program, Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort said campaign staff would sit down with the Commission on Presidential Debates "in the next week or so" to discuss the debate schedule, which includes three forums with Trump and Democratic rival Hillary Clinton and one between the vice presidential nominees, Republican Mike Pence and Democrat Tim Kaine.

Chief among Trump's complaints about the debate schedule, set nearly a year ago by the independent commission, is that two of the debates overlap with NFL games.

"Mr. Trump said, 'I want a debate. I will do three debates, but I want it to be the maximum audience,'" Manafort said. "So we're going to sit down with the commission in the next week or so, and we're going to start talking to them, and we want to make sure that we have a broad audience."

Priebus concurred, though he added it would be up to the campaigns to settle the issue.

"It's up to the nominee of both parties to make that decision, but certainly the RNC's going to be involved in supporting our nominee and his position on this," Priebus said. "My personal view is that we need to maximize the audience, and that's going to be either a Tuesday, Wednesday or a Thursday night, and that's where we stand on the issue."

Manafort said he doesn't question the integrity of the commission, saying Trump wants to take part in all the debates, but he emphasized the need for as large an audience as possible.

Trump has said "he wants to participate in them, but just like we discovered in the hack of the DNC, Mrs. Clinton likes low audiences watching at her debates," Manafort said. "That's what she conspired for to keep Bernie Sanders from getting a large audience."