In the zone: Harris conducted debate on her turf, effective at 'drawing out Trump's worst qualities'
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00:00So, it was a fiery 90 minutes on the debate stage in Philadelphia. Donald Trump and Kamala
00:09Harris had never met before, and it didn't take long for the political arguments to become
00:14personal. The Democratic candidate attacked her Republican rival for spreading falsehoods
00:20on abortion and on immigration. And it seemed Trump struggled to stay on message and focus
00:27on issues where he polls well, like the economy. Well, let's start by listening to one exchange
00:34where Harris goaded Trump about crowd sizes at his rallies. Take a listen to what happened
00:42next.
00:43In Springfield, they're eating the dogs, the people that came in, they're eating the cats,
00:51they're eating the pets of the people that live there. And this is what's happening in
00:57our country. And it's a shame. The people on television say my dog was taken and used
01:02for food. I'm not taking this from television. But the people on television say the dog was
01:06eaten by the people that went there. Again, the Springfield city manager says there's
01:11no evidence of that. Vice President Harris, I'll let you respond to the rest of what you've
01:14heard.
01:15You talk about extreme.
01:17Well, quite a moment there in the debate and to talk about the highs, lows and some of
01:23those downright bizarre moments. I'm with Alan Schroeder now. He's the author of Presidential
01:30Debates Risky Business on the Campaign Trail. He's also a professor of journalism at Northeastern
01:36University. Hello to you. Thanks for joining us.
01:41First of all, big picture. How do you think the debate went last night?
01:45You know, a lot of times debates are really hard to declare a winner and a loser because
01:50they both do things well and this and that. But last night was as clear a win as I've
01:56ever seen in a presidential debate. And of course, it was Kamala Harris who won the debate.
02:03Well, let's talk a bit then about Donald Trump, because in the debate that he had with Joe
02:09Biden a while ago, there were concerns afterwards about Biden's mental acuity. Of course, his
02:15performance in the debate effectively forced Biden out of the race. Now we have Trump going
02:21on these tangents, talking about how the Democrats want to execute babies in the ninth month
02:28of pregnancy, talking about, as we played in that soundbite, immigrants eating cats.
02:34I mean, look, are Americans worried now about Donald Trump's mental acuity?
02:40Sure. I mean, I think that's a fair critique. It almost felt like Harris did to Trump what
02:46Biden did to himself back in the June debate, just sort of exposing him as, you know, someone
02:53that you would have a lot of questions about, even if it was just your family member. So
02:59yes, I think that this was a terrible night for Trump and it is making people rethink,
03:06how could this job be done by a man in this mental condition?
03:12And Trump afterwards went into the spin room, didn't he? That's rather unusual for a candidate
03:18themselves. Does that suggest to you that he had a sense that his debate hadn't gone fully to plan?
03:25Yes. I think him going into the spin room was evidence that he was having to do damage control,
03:32that, you know, he was not taking a victory lap in that spin room. He was trying to draw attention
03:38away from the fact that he had had such a bad debate. And of course, he went right for Fox
03:43News and the people who were friendly to him. And, you know, it was just a bizarre moment.
03:49Well, let's talk about Kamala Harris then. The debate was a moment, wasn't it, for her
03:55to define herself in front of an audience of millions of Americans, because there are plenty
04:00of voters who say even though she's been vice president, they didn't know that much about her.
04:06How do you think she did? I think she did extremely well. I mean,
04:09if I had one critique, there were times she might have seemed a little overprepared,
04:14but she was in the zone. She was listening. She knew exactly what she needed to say,
04:20when she needed to say it. And the thing that she was so effective at was drawing out Trump's worst
04:25qualities by goading him, by insulting him in a subtle way that really got under his skin.
04:33And he just imploded, you know, and as a result of all of that,
04:37the topics were her topics. The debate was conducted on her turf, not his.
04:43And I'd be interested to get your take as a journalism professor on the role that the
04:48moderators played last night, because they took a more assertive role in fact checking
04:54Donald Trump than they did during his debate with Biden. How important do you think that was?
05:00I think that was really important. I was glad to see that, because I think journalists in the US
05:05have a tendency to not want to make waves when it comes to political topics. And so I thought
05:10the moderators handled this very well. And it wasn't as though they were, you know, beating
05:16Trump over the head with it. They would just, when he made a misstatement, they would just come out
05:19and correct the record very calmly in one sentence and move to the next thing.
05:24That's the way it should be done.
05:26And I appreciate you're a journalism professor, but I'd love to get your view, of course,
05:30on whether you think this is going to move the dial with those key undecided voters now.
05:36Well, we shall see. I mean, right now, the race is a statistical tie. And I think the debate was
05:43an opportunity to break the logjam one way or the other. And if it's going to break in anyone's
05:48favour, it will break in favour of Kamala Harris. And of course, it does, as you say, come down to
05:54those swing state voters in six or seven US states who will determine the outcome of this election.
06:00Just a final thought from you. What are the chances you think that there'll be a second
06:04debate between the pair?
06:06Well, the Harris campaign has already indicated their willingness to do another debate. And Trump
06:11is backing away from that as fast as he can. I don't think he wants to risk another humiliation
06:17in front of tens of millions of people like we saw last night. So I would be very surprised if
06:24there's another presidential debate this year.
06:27Alan Schroeder, the author of Presidential Debates,
06:29Risky Business on the Campaign Trail. Great to talk to you. Thanks very much.