A Stumbling Trump Receives a Well-Deserved Shellacking at the First Presidential Debate

A huge amount was at stake for Kamala Harris in last night’s presidential election debate with Donald Trump.   

The initial burst of enthusiasm for her candidacy had been replaced in recent days by nagging doubts about whether she had what it takes to beat Donald Trump. Her successful campaign launch did not seem to be translating into a sustained lead in opinion polls. Instead, she and Trump were largely running head-to-head on the eve of the debate, including in the seven swing states which will determine the outcome of the race – Georgia, Nevada, Arizona, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin and North Carolina.  

Many overseas observers might reasonably wonder how on earth an aging, rambling, convicted felon, serial adulterer, and pathological liar, who has repeatedly sought to undermine America’s electoral process, trash-talked American allies, and cozied up to dictators, could possibly be in such close contention to become President again.  

But, this is to misunderstand what issues are at the top of most Americans’ minds. Many voters have become tired of America’s “forever wars” and support more disengagement from the world. This includes dialling back support for Ukraine, especially since Biden has failed to articulate a winning strategy to the American public. Trump’s messages about uncontrolled immigration have resonated with many, as have his attacks on the democrats’ alleged embrace of extreme diversity, equity and inclusion policies. A majority of Republicans still believe his false claims that the 2020 election was stolen.  Trump’s well-detailed character flaws either seem baked into voters’ perceptions of him, or are waved away as being examples of media bias.   

Astonishingly, despite being a former President, Trump has managed to pitch himself as the outsider, channelling anti-incumbency sentiment to take on the establishment and the hated “liberal elites”. He has also sought to distance himself from his party’s most extreme anti-abortion stances, the one policy area where the Harris team has had a clear advantage. 

Meanwhile, on the other side, some have worried about Harris’s abilities as a candidate, reinforced by her decision to avoid most live media engagements, her numerous policy reversals, and her association with unpopular aspects of the Biden administration, including the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan, and its handling of the economy, immigration, and the crisis in the Middle East.  

Harris has also struggled so far to win over middle-aged, primarily white, men. Whether this is due to sexism, racism, or other factors, she appeared to be losing momentum.   

So last night’s debate was arguably a more important moment for her than Trump – a critical opportunity to reach out to undecided voters, define her character and policies more persuasively, and put Trump more on the defensive about his.  

So did she do enough to succeed? 

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Blow After Blow

The answer, emphatically, is yes. From the get go, when Harris walked over to Trump to shake his hand at the start of the debate, she put her stamp on the proceedings. After a slightly nervous first answer, on the economy, she steadily grew more confident and composed as the debate went on, while Trump became more testy and incoherent.  

Using her skills as a prosecutor, Harris landed blow after blow on Trump’s record in office, his character deficiencies, his affinity for dictators (“who know they can manipulate you with flattery and favours”), his divisive rhetoric, and the danger he would present to American democracy, and the world, if he was allowed back into the White House for a second term, this time “without guardrails.”  

She accused Trump of having “no plan for you, because he’s only looking out for himself”. She repeatedly criticized him  for resorting to “the same old tired playbook of lies, grievances and name calling” and insisted that America wanted to turn the page on the politics of division. 

Where Trump tried to argue he had done a good thing by overturning the Supreme Court’s Roe vs Wade ruling and instead allowing individual states to decide on their policies, she pointed out that this had resulted in some states passing legislation outlawing abortion even in cases of rape, incest, and the life of the mother. “That is immoral. Government should not be telling women what to do with their bodies.” 

She brutally hammered away on his criminal record, saying it was “a bit rich” for him to claim to be concerned about crime, when he was a convicted felon, who had faced multiple cases concerning financial fraud, sexual assault and harm to national security. She called him out for his disrespect for military veterans. She also highlighted his role in inciting the mob to attack the US Capitol on January 6th,  in defending white supremacists at Charlottesville, and supporting the right wing militia, the Proud Boys, and said “there is a place in our campaign to stand for our country, for democracy, and the rule of law, and to end the approach of attacking the foundation of our democracy because you don’t like the outcome”.  

She pointed out that over 200 Republicans who had served in Trump’s first administration were now backing her, and cited quotes from top officials such as Defence Secretary Mark Esper, and former National Security advisor John Bolton describing Trump as “dangerous and unfit”, and contending that the nation would “never survive” a second Trump term.  

She also successfully needled Trump with repeated jabs on sensitive topics – for example about the role played by Trump’s bete noire, former Senator John McCain, in blocking Trump’s effort to overturn Obama care, and the size of Trump’s rallies. Looking into the camera, she urged Americans to attend one of these, so they could see for themselves how much he rambled on – for example about fictional characters, like Hannibal Lecter, until attendees eventually got bored and drifted away. She also taunted him about his electoral loss to Joe Biden in 2020, saying he was “fired by 81 million voters”.  

Trump was unable to land many effective blows in return. Constantly on the defensive about his own record and character, he often resorted to wild exaggerations and insults in return which undermined the effectiveness of the points he was trying to make. For example, for much of the debate, he kept harping on about illegal immigration. But he described the problem in such excessive terms (millions and millions flooding into the country, many of them criminals or lunatics sent by other nations, destroying America etc) that he just sounded unhinged. Meanwhile, Harris was able to point out that the only reason the administration had not been able to pass legislation to strengthen border security was because he had instructed Republican Members of Congress to block it – “because he wanted to run on a problem, rather than fix it.”  

Harris was also quick to squash some of his other outlandish accusations – for example clarifying that she and her vice president candidate Tim Walz owned guns, and had no intention of banning all guns. “This is just another one of his lies.” 

Trump also flailed on foreign policy. While Harris strongly supported Ukraine’s “righteous defence”, Trump refused to say whether he wanted Ukraine to win against Russia. Instead, he unconvincingly claimed he could negotiate an end to the conflict within days of being elected.  Harris quickly leapt on this to argue that if Trump was President, Putin would not only be sitting in Kyiv, but already eyeing up Poland – calling on Pennsylvania’s 800,000 Polish American citizens to take note of Trump’s support for their foe. “Putin would eat you [Trump] for lunch”. 

When Harris asserted that world leaders laughed at Trump, Trump cited Hungary’s authoritarian leader, Viktor Orban, as a character reference. While Harris deftly handled a question on the Middle East, arguing that she would always support Israel’s right to self defence, but that there needed to be security, justice and statehood for Palestinians as well, Trump went on an incoherent rant accusing her of hating Arabs and Jews.   

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Fact Checked

For once, the moderators actually did their job, in pushing Trump to answer specific questions – for example on how he would implement his proposal to deport millions of immigrants, or whether he still stood by his claim that the 2020 election was stolen. They also repeatedly fact checked some of his most most blatant lies, for example, that Democrats supported abortion up to the 9th month of pregnancy, and even allowed babies to be killed after birth, as well as his ludicrous claim that illegal immigrants were eating people’s pets in Springfield, Ohio.

The moderators also pushed Harris on some of her vulnerabilities, for example her changing stance on fracking, and role in the chaotic Afghanistan withdrawal, but she was largely able to turn the focus back onto Trump’s approach on these issues.  

There were times when Trump’s rantings became so extreme that Harris strained to disguise her incredulity. At one point, when questioned on a comment he made in August that Harris had only recently “become black”, he said “I don’t care, she can be whatever she wants to be” – as if race was as matter of choice, rather than birth. Rather than dwell on her own case, she used the opportunity to highlight other examples of Trump’s racism – for example, in discriminating against blacks looking for housing, and calling for the Central Park Five to be executed. But most of the time, she let his absurdities speak for themselves.

Throughout the evening she looked poised and sounded coherent. Every intervention was used to expose a Trump weakness, or land a jab. Like a classical orator, one of her most effective rhetorical ploys was to use repetition to emphasise particular points: “let us remember…..let us remember….let us remember; it is well known that…it is well known that….”.

In her closing statement, she said America wanted a leader who could unite the country and lift people up, not beat people down. Her candidacy offered a vision for the future; Trump’s campaign remained stuck in the past.

In his closing statement, instead of delivering his campaign’s key policy messages, Trump again resorted to personal attacks on Biden and Harris (“the worst President and Vice President in history”) and wild assertions about America being in decline, and facing “World War three.”

Perhaps his only truly effective point came right at the very end, when he asked why, if Harris had so many wonderful plans for America, hadn’t she implemented any of them in the three and a half years she had been in office.

But this came too late to change the overall tenor of the debate. Harris took the fight to Trump, and won it, hands down. Within minutes of its end, pop icon Taylor Swift posted on Instagram that she was backing Harris – pointedly signing her post “Taylor Swift, Childless Cat Lady.”

I suspect Trump, who quickly descended into the post-debate ‘spin room’ where he pushed out more fake claims about polls suggesting he’d won, will be hopping mad about how the evening turned out. But after tonight’s shellacking, I doubt he’ll be up for a rematch.

This article was amended after publication to correct the number of Polish American citizens in Pennsylvania