On September 10th, Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump faced off in their first presidential debate, moderated by ABC. In this issue of Middle Grounds, our writers argue who the winner was.
- The Editorial Board
Kamala Harris Won: Harris Successfully Exposed Trump’s Weaknesses and Delivered A Clear Vision For the Future
Vice President Kamala Harris soundly defeated former President Donald Trump during their debate. Harris prosecuted the case against Trump, laid traps for the former president, and attempted to define herself as this election’s change candidate. At almost every opportunity, Harris succeeded in backing Trump into his ugliest corners, highlighting his most unappealing positions and keeping the former president on the defensive. Compared to President Biden’s performance in the first presidential debate in June, Harris undoubtedly resuscitated many Democrats’ faith in their party.
From the tip-off, a familiar pattern was established that would largely remain in place throughout the night: Harris would simultaneously attempt to lay out an affirmative vision for the nation while laying bait for the former president. Then, Trump would fall into that trap, making himself look out of touch with the average American voter. The most astonishing example of this came when discussing one of Trump’s strongest issues, immigration. When Harris was pressed about her role within the Biden administration as “Border Czar,” she diverted to dressing down President Trump for his smothering of this year’s bipartisan border security deal back in February. Not only did Harris successfully dodge the heat, she also slyly insulted the quality of Trump’s rallies, a known insecurity: “And what you will also notice is that people start leaving his rallies early out of exhaustion and boredom. And I will tell you the one thing you will not hear him talk about is you.”
Trump responded by biting the lure immediately, wasting the first 30 seconds of his reply time defending the size of his rallies, and using the remaining 30 seconds to propagate a baseless story that migrants in Springfield, Ohio are eating residents’ pets. David Muir immediately fact-checked Trump’s claim, citing that the city’s manager told ABC News that there were no credible reports of these claims. Harris, meanwhile, was grinning from ear to ear, seemingly unable to believe the former president’s willingness to wrap himself up in the most insignificant of slights.
According to Google Trends, the most searched political issue during the debate in 49 of the 50 states was abortion. The only outlier was Ohio; the top issue searched there was immigration, likely due to the Springfield dog-eating conspiracy. During the section of the debate dedicated to abortion, Trump insinuated that Democrats are for post-birth abortions, and praised the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. Harris responded by surgically laying the blame for the destruction of millions of Americans’ reproductive rights at Trump’s feet, pledging to restore the protections of Roe v. Wade and claiming that Trump would sign a national abortion ban into law. When moderator Linsey Davis mentioned that Trump’s running mate JD Vance had already said that he would veto a national abortion ban and asked for a “Yes or No” answer on the topic, Trump waffled about the Biden administration’s failed student loan forgiveness plan: “Well, I didn’t discuss it with JD In all fairness. JD — And I don’t mind if he has a certain view but I think he was speaking for me but I really didn’t. Look, we don’t have to discuss it because she’d never be able to get it just like she couldn’t get student loans. They couldn’t get — they didn’t even come close to getting student loans. They didn’t even come close to getting student loans. They taunted young people and a lot of other people that had loans. They can never get this approved. So it doesn’t matter what she says about going to congress. Wonderful. Let’s go to Congress. Do it. But the fact is that for years they wanted to get it out of Congress and out of the federal government and we did something that everybody said couldn’t be done. And now you have a vote of the people on abortion.”
In response to that largely irrelevant word salad, Harris stayed on message: “And understand what has been happening under Donald Trump’s abortion bans. Couples who pray and dream of having a family are being denied IVF treatments. What is happening in our country, working people, working women who are working one or two jobs, who can barely afford childcare as it is, have to travel to another state to get on a plane sitting next to strangers, to go and get the health care she needs. Barely can afford to do it. And what you are putting her through is unconscionable. And the people of America have not — the majority of Americans believe in a woman’s right to make decisions about her own body. And that is why in every state where this issue has been on the ballot, in red and blue states both, the people of America have voted for freedom.” On the most searched political issue of the night, Trump fell totally flat on his face, and Harris became the effective reproductive freedom advocate the Democratic Party has been clamoring for.
But it wasn’t just Harris laying traps, or beating up on Trump rhetorically at what felt like every opportunity. Trump also turned in the worst individual debate performance that he’s had since entering politics. When questioned regarding his previous attacks on the Vice President’s racial identity, he repeated his claim that Harris “happened to turn Black.” In response to the moderators asking whether or not he had a plan to repeal and replace Obamacare, Trump claimed to have “a concept of a plan,” while Harris touted the Biden administration’s accomplishments in the field. In my view, what was most egregious was Trump’s continued denial of his 2020 election loss, despite there still being no evidence for that claim. And this is after the Vice President spent much of the night asking the American people to “turn the page” on the former president. It’s even clearer now, on the largest stage of this election cycle, that Trump is incapable of ceasing to act on his worst instincts.
When it came time for each candidate to deliver their closing remarks, again Vice President Harris overshadowed President Trump. She highlighted her commitment to bringing down the cost of living, safeguarding seniors’ social security, protecting reproductive rights, keeping our military strong, and investing in the American people. President Trump used his closing remarks to claim we’re on the path to World War 3 and that Harris is the worst vice president in the history of our nation. While Harris spent the night laying an affirmative agenda in front of the American people and highlighting Trump’s pitfalls, President Trump came across as old, self-absorbed, and past his prime.
- Wyatt Carter
Donald Trump Won: Despite Biased Moderators, Trump Effectively Reinforced His Economic Messaging and Positioned Himself As The Stronger Leader
The presidential debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump was a huge win for the Trump campaign, and Donald Trump succeeded in the goals he set out to accomplish for his voting base. Through sowing discontent with the ABC moderators and the stances he took during the debate, Donald Trump was able to effectively display Harris’s wavering on issues while ensuring his message stays true to the platform he built and his supporters have voted for in the past.
“It’s the economy, stupid.” This famous phrase was coined by James Carville, Bill Clinton’s lead political strategist. Although Carville might not agree with Trump’s policies, he does agree that the economy is a major factor in what voters look for when deciding a candidate. The CNN poll after the debate offers insight into the effectiveness of Trump’s debate performance on his platform. The poll reflects that “voters who tuned in gave Trump a 20-point advantage over Harris after the debate on handling the economy, 55% to 35% – a margin that’s slightly wider than his pre-debate edge.” Trump did a great job pointing to tangible evidence that his economy was better than Biden and Harris’s. He pointed at gas prices being much higher under the Biden administration than they were under his own administration. He then connected with the average American voter by stating, “People can’t go out and buy cereal or bacon or eggs or anything else. The people of our country are absolutely dying with what they’ve done. They’ve destroyed the economy.” This direct rhetoric connected directly with voters, as displayed by the polls. Trump also drew attention to inflation, and asserted that the inflation under the Biden-Harris administration cost American households each $28,000. Donald Trump’s strong stance on illegal immigration resonated very strongly with his base, who feels that it should be a top concern for the incoming administration. Donald Trump was able to emphasize the importance of the border crisis to a base that was already upset over the issue. He put Harris on the defensive for an issue that the Biden administration put her in charge of, pointing out how many illegal immigrants have crossed the border. He declared that he is for the American people, while Harris is for those coming in. This message resonated with voters, and the post-debate CNN poll reflects that; Trump still holds a 23-percentage lead in the handling of illegal immigration.
Despite all of the social policy that Trump dodged answering, at the end of the day, the economy is incredibly important to voters when they submit their ballots. According to Pew Research, the economy is the number one issue for voters. Trump made sure to speak to this in his debate, which he did very effectively.
Trump’s lead is maintained through the fact-checking controversy of the debate, where Trump felt that it was more of a 3-on-1 debate and that the moderators were against him. I can admit that Trump said some very weird stuff during the debate. Between the Springfield example and the line, “Now she wants to do transgender operations on illegal aliens who are in prison,” viewers’ debate bingo cards were all adequately getting checked off. However, the moderators failed to fact-check Harris during this debate while fact-checking Trump. Harris claimed that there are no U.S. military members in active combat, which is false (there are about 2,500 troops in Iraq as I write this). Like Trump, Harris also misrepresented statistics to the American people. She claimed that Trump lost about 180,000 manufacturing jobs, a loss largely due to the pandemic; before, there were over 400,000 jobs gained in that industry under Donald Trump.
Through these misrepresentations on both sides, Donald Trump was still successful in painting himself as a strong leader. According to the CNN poll, “Identical shares of debate watchers, 54%, said that they had at least some confidence in Harris’ and Trump’s respective abilities to lead the country, with 36% saying they had a lot of confidence in Trump and 32% that they had a lot of confidence in Harris. In June, just 14% who tuned in for the presidential debate between Trump and Biden expressed a lot of confidence in Biden’s ability to lead.” Donald Trump has successfully portrayed the image of a strong leader, as displayed in the poll where he carries a six-point lead over Harris in confidence as commander-in-chief.
Looking at the fallout of the debate, it is also clear that Harris did not win the debate.
She did not get the strong bump in polls that typically occurs after a fantastic debate performance. Also, Harris did not get an endorsement from Teamsters after the debate, a large nationwide union who has supported a Democratic candidate every election since 1996. Through the polls, it is clear that Kamala did not win the debate, and Donald Trump was able to effectively display himself as a strong leader who will fix the economy and immigration issues.
- Gianna Hunsche
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