by Carl P. Leubsdorf
The year’s first presidential debate sank the reelection chances of President Joe Biden. The second one may have severely damaged the prospects of Donald Trump — and boosted those of Kamala Harris.
In an ABC News encounter as one-sided as the Biden-Trump clash in June, Harris forcefully argued Tuesday night that it’s time for America “to turn the page.” She emotionally defended her support of abortion rights and constantly goaded Trump into a shouting, disorganized defense of his own familiar positions.
At the same time, the former president did a poor job of prosecuting the GOP case against his Democratic rival on issues like her changes in positions from her 2020 candidacy and the current administration’s problems in coping with inflation and multiple crises abroad.
Though each presidential debate is unique, this one at Philadelphia’s National Constitution Center fit the frequent pattern in which the lesser-known candidate outperformed the better-known one. But it will take a few days before post-debate polling confirms the ultimate impact in an election where pre-debate surveys showed Harris and Trump almost even, nationally and in battleground states.
Several independent measurements exemplified the vice president’s strong showing. A CNN poll of debate watchers showed 63% said she won. A CNN focus group in Erie, Pa., a “swing” area in the crucial state, produced a similar 2-to-1 margin.
And even some Republicans and conservatives conceded that Harris did well. “She passed the test,” Republican strategist David Urban said on CNN. “She looked presidential.”
“Make no mistake about it,” veteran Fox News analyst Brit Hume concluded. “Trump had a bad night.”
The GOP nominee disagreed. “I thought that was my best debate, ever,” Trump told reporters. But when asked about the Harris campaign’s call for another debate, he replied, “We’ll look at it, but they want a second debate because they lost.”
CNN fact-checker Daniel Dale found that Trump made more than 30 false claims during the debate, while Harris made just one. ABC moderators David Muir and Linsey Davis corrected the former president on several occasions.
One was in the exchange that typified the inaccurate claims Trump made through the night, as he repeatedly contended that illegal immigrants “are destroying the fabric of our country.”
“In Springfield (Ohio), they’re eating the dogs,” he said. “The people that came in. They’re eating the cats. They’re eating — they’re eating the pets of the people that live there. And this is what’s happening in our country.”
Muir said Springfield’s city manager told ABC News “there have been no credible reports of specific claims of pets being harmed, injured or abused by individuals within the immigrant community.”
“But the people on television say their dog was eaten by the people that went there,” Trump persisted. “Again,” Muir noted, “the Springfield city manager says there’s no evidence of that.”
One Harris sally that roused Trump was when she derided the campaign rallies whose size he has always cited as evidence of his popularity. “People start leaving his rallies early out of exhaustion and boredom,” she said.
“And I will tell you the one thing you will not hear him talk about is you,” she said. “I believe you deserve a president who actually puts you first. And I pledge to you that I will.”
“People don’t go to her rallies,” Trump falsely claimed. “There’s no reason to go. And the people that do go, she’s busing them in and paying them to be there.”
Harris also caused a sharp response by citing her high-profile Republican supporters, including former Vice President Dick Cheney and his daughter, former Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney, and quoting critical statements about Trump from his former chief of staff, national security adviser and defense secretary.
“I fired most of those people,” Trump replied. “They did bad things or a bad job.”
When the debate turned to foreign policy, Trump refused to answer Muir’s question about whether he wanted Ukraine to win its war against Russia.
“I want the war to stop,” he said. “I want to save lives that are being uselessly — people being killed by the millions.” He repeated his claim that, if he wins, he could settle the war even before his inauguration, deriding Biden as “a president that doesn’t know he’s alive.”
When Muir asked Harris how she would deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin, she said that “first of all, it’s important to remind the former president, you’re not running against Joe Biden, you’re running against me.
“I believe the reason that Donald Trump says that this war would be over within 24 hours is because he would just give it up,” she said. “Putin would be sitting in Kyiv with his eyes on the rest of Europe. Starting with Poland.
“Why don’t you tell the 800,000 Polish Americans right here in Pennsylvania how quickly you would give up for the sake of favor and what you think is a friendship with what is known to be a dictator who would eat you for lunch?” she asked Trump.
When the vice president said world leaders she has met “are laughing at Donald Trump” and military leaders call him a “disgrace,” he invoked his endorsement from Viktor Orban, Hungary’s autocratic prime minister.
In all, it was a very good night for Harris, and it ended with yet another boost: the endorsement of iconic pop music star Taylor Swift — a native Pennsylvanian.
