Trump, Harris Meet in First Presidential Debate

Since the Republican Party unanimously voted to quit the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD) in 2022, the traditional debate formatting and scheduling has been left up to the networks and the candidates for a more carte blanche approach. Former President Donald Trump (R-FL) and President Joe Biden (D-DE) met in a historically early debate in late June, which began the cavalcade of calls for Biden to quit the race.

Vice President Kamala Harris (D-CA) clinched the nomination in the first round of voting at the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Chicago last month, avoiding a contested convention while providing an alternative to voters in a move that hasn’t been made since 1968.

Trump and Harris met on Tuesday night for their first, and so far only, debate. Since the CPD is no longer overseeing the debates, it will be up to the candidates to schedule another. Vice Presidential nominees Senator J.D. Vance (R-OH) and Governor Tim Walz (D-MN) have agreed to an October 1 debate hosted by CBS in New York.

Harris has said that she would not agree to another debate unless Trump attended Tuesday night’s match. Deliberation for another display now goes to the campaigns. Trump has called for multiple debates, with a proposed date of September 25.

Tuesday night’s duel featured a historically unusual set of candidates: a former president seeking a second, nonconsecutive term – the first since Grover Cleveland (D-NY) was elected in 1884 and again in 1892 after losing in 1888 – and the successive nominee to a president who made the unprecedented decision to suspend his campaign – the first to do so since Lyndon Johsnon (D-TX) in 1968.

As such, conversation swirled around Trump’s accomplishments from 2017 to 2021 and Harris’ accomplishments, vis-à-vis her role in the Biden Administration, for the last three-and-a-half years.

The ninety-minute debate, with two commercial breaks, featured microphones that could be muted by the moderators – David Muir and Linsey Davis of ABC – at will, as well as no live audience. No opening remarks were permitted, but the first question was geared towards the economy.

Harris opened by stating that she was raised as a “middle-class kid,” a distinction only she had, compared to her opponent. She stated that her “one of her passions” is small businesses, and she intends to extend a $6,000 tax cut for families to go towards children’s needs, as well as a $50,000 tax deduction to start-ups. She said that Trump’s economic policies provided tax cuts for “billionaires and big corporations,” which she said will contribute to a $5 trillion addition to the national deficit. She also said that Trump’s sales tax plan would result in a “20% tax on everyday goods.”

Trump stated that the sales tax statement was “incorrect,” and that his administration emphasized tariffs on foreign goods.

“Other countries are going to finally, after seventy-five years, pay us back for all that we’ve done for the world,” said Trump, regarding military protection, foreign aid, and other expenditures. He said that his administration took “billions and billions of dollars” from China and said that the Biden-Harris Administration “never took the tariffs off” because of how much revenue they had generated.

Trump also railed against the incumbent administration over inflation, which he called a “country buster” that has been unprecedentedly high in modern times.

Trump also spoke broadly of “millions of people pouring into our country from prisons, jails, mental institutions, and insane asylums,” who are also “taking jobs” from “African Americans, Hispanics, and unions.”

He also condemned the actions of immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, who have reportedly been abducting neighborhood pets to be consumed, and in Aurora, Colorado, where a migrant gang took over an apartment building.

Harris responded by saying that Trump left the current administration with the “worst unemployment since the Great Depression, the world public health epidemic in a century [the COVID-19 Pandemic], and the worst attack on our democracy since the Civil War [the January 6 Capitol riot].

Harris also took the liberty of telling viewers that they would hear from the “same old, tired playbook, a bunch of lies, grievances, and name-calling” before the rest of the debate ensued. She also linked Trump to Project 2025, a playbook of desired conservative policies by a right-wing think tank unaffiliated with the former president.

Trump asserted he has “nothing to do with Project 2025,” he hasn’t read it, and that he has no desire to read it. He guesses that the plan has “some good” and “some bad” ideas, but that “it makes no difference,” as he has no affiliation with the project or its conceivers.

Trump asserted his administration’s response to the COVID-19 Pandemic and said that Biden and Harris claimed “bounce back” jobs in their jobs report, meaning the jobs that naturally resurfaced after the peak of the pandemic should not have been considered part of their economic platform.

Harris said that Trump’s economic plans have gained the disapproval of “Goldman Sachs” and “sixteen Nobel laureates,” while Trump said that his professors from the Wharton School of FInance find his plan “brilliant.” Trump also said that Harris does not have a comprehensive economic plan.

Trump accused Harris of “going to” his political “philosophies” for political convenience, but said that she will “change” once she’s elected. He then called her a Marxist, that her father is a “Marxist professor in economics,” and that he “taught her well.”

The conversation then turned to abortion, an issue largely seen as political suicide for Republicans, while Democrats rode the environment after the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade to a better-than-expected midterm in 2022.

Trump defends his placement of Supreme Court Justices who led to the overturning of the law, and said that states now have their voices on the matter. He said that he accomplished a feat that had been attempted for “fifty-two years,” in giving that power back to the states was a solution desired by legal scholars and officials of both political parties.

Since the overturning of the case, several states have held referenda on codifying the right to abortion in their constitutions. Kansas and Ohio, the former being a staunchly-conservative state and the latter being a red-trending battleground, both passed their propositions by large margins. Trump acknowledged this at the debate, saying that the issue is no longer “tied up in the federal government.” He also stated that he supports the exceptions of rape, incest, and endangerment in the life of the mother, but he also said that some states legally allow late-term abortions and even post-birth “executions” in some cases.

Moderator Linsey Davis was quick to correct him that there are currently no states where such acts are legal.

Harris countered Trump’s arguments of states’ rights, saying that some states have taken aggressive stances on the matter, including criminal penalties for doctors or nurses who assist in providing the procedure.

“One does not have to abandon their faith or deeply-held beliefs to agree that the government, and Donald Trump certainly, should not be telling a woman what to do with her body,” said Harris.

She then pledged to sign a bill, if elected, replacing the protections of Roe v. Wade, contingent on Congress’ action on the matter.

Trump denied Harris’ claim that he would sign a national abortion ban, and that such a debate is pointless because the issue is now in the hands of the states. Trump also countered Harris “lie” that he was against in-vitro fertilization (IVF), stating that he has been a “leader” on the issue and that he aided Alabama’s approval of the practice.

On immigration, Harris said she had the distinction of being “the only person” on the stage to prosecute transnational criminal organizations for trafficking of guns, drugs, and people. She stated that Trump “ran” from the problem rather than addressing it and even went as far as to invoke his words of “fictional characters,” such as Dr. Hannibal Lecter, at his rallies.

Trump, in his response, first addressed the rallies, saying that “people don’t go to her [Harris’] rallies.” He said the U.S. is a “failing nation” because of the border crisis and repeatedly said that numerous other countries have experienced downturns in their crime rates because they are “sending their criminals here.”

Harris slammed Trump for former members of his administration criticizing his domestic security plans, to which Trump said that he “fired” people when they “did bad things or a bad job.” He added that the current administration “never fired one person.” He said that regarding the 2021 Afghanistan withdrawal, Biden should have “fired all those generals” responsible and invoked the thirteen service members who were killed due to the withdrawal.

Harris criticized Trump’s thirty-four felony counts and drew a contrast to his law-and-order platform, to which Trump stated that the current administration has “weaponized” the Department of Justice and that Biden never faced consequences for possessing classified documents, while Trump’s residence was raided by the FBI.

The moderators asked Harris on her changing platforms, specifically from her first run for president in 2020. Harris stated that she will “not ban fracking,” and that she was the tie-breaking Senate vote on the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which “opened new leases for fracking.” She then said that the U.S. should “invest in diverse sources of energy so we reduce our reliance on foreign oil.”

Trump criticized her fluctuation on the issues, stating that she had repeatedly campaigned on banning fracking and helped raise money for bail for Minneapolis rioters in the summer of 2020.

The moderators then questioned Trump on his role in the January 6 Capitol riot, asking him if he regretted any of his actions. Trump fell short of a “yes” or “no” answer, but said that he did not organize the rally, he only spoke and asked for “peaceful and patriotic” protesting. He also said he had requested 10,000 National Guardsmen in the capital in anticipation of the event, but was denied by then-Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D, CA-12) and Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser (D).

Harris criticized Trump’s foreign policies, stating that if he were to win in November, that Vladimir Putin would be “sitting in Kiev with eyes on the rest of Europe.” Interestingly, she detailed a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to advise him and NATO leaders on foreign policy regarding Russia, and even “shared…American intelligence about how he could defend himself.” Just days later, Russia launched their invasion of Ukraine.

Trump countered that Putin recently vocalized his desire for Harris to win, calling the administration “weak and stupid,” and that American adversaries prefer such leadership in Washington.

Harris closed by saying that Trump is “focused on the past” and is trying to “take us backward.”

“As a prosecutor I never asked a victim or a witness ‘are you a Republican or a Democrat?’ The only thing I ever asked them, ‘are you okay?’” said Harris. “And that’s the kind of president we need right now. Someone who cares about you and is not putting themselves first.

Trump had won the coin toss prior to the debate and chose to give his closing argument last. He said over the last near-four years, Harris hasn’t delivered on the promises she’s currently making.

“She’s been there for three-and-a-half years. They’ve had three-and-a-half years to fix the border. They’ve had three-and-a-half years to create jobs and all the things we talked about. Why hasn’t she done it?” said Trump. “She should leave right now, go down to that beautiful White House, go to the Capitol, get everyone together and do the things you want to do. But you haven’t done it. And you won’t do it.”