After eight years, much suffering, and a disaster that led to the withdrawal of their leader in June, none other than the sitting president, Joe Biden, the Democratic Party finally found the right formula to clearly win an electoral debate against Donald Trump. A solid strategy executed soberly by Kamala Harris, the vice president, the same person who until just a few weeks ago was not only disparaged by the former president, who never lacked derogatory terms to belittle her, but also by her own, who saw her as weak, lacking charisma, incapable of defeating the billionaire who has turned the country, society, and global politics upside down in the last decade.
After a fierce exchange on leadership, economy, international politics, and social issues, Harris emerges strengthened, without making mistakes, and successfully manages to unsettle Trump on several occasions, revealing his most irascible, uncontrolled, and erratic side. Analysts, opinion makers, political strategists, and above all the public agreed on the diagnosis. 63% of registered voters who watched ABC on Tuesday night considered that the vice president performed better, according to a CNN survey, compared to only 37% who saw the Republican as the winner. Before the debate, the same voters were evenly divided on which candidate would prevail.
Analysts had been speculating for weeks about the clash. It was not an epic night, it may not stand out in history books, but it provided much excitement and maintained a good pace, especially in its central part. And it managed to surprise almost everyone. It is too early to determine the real impact of the confrontation on the polls, especially in the most contested states, but traditionally a clear victory has temporarily boosted candidacies by a few percentage points.
The Democrat's plan could not have been simpler: present her more moderate and centrist side, target Trump's ego, and wait for his anger to do the rest. And it worked perfectly. She remained calm and smiling all night, "strong, but without stridency," in the words of Senator Chuck Schumer, one of the heavyweights of the progressive front. Without taking the bait, without getting entangled, ignoring personal jabs and the rhetorical torrent that characterizes Trump, a force of nature.
Unlike Hillary Clinton or Joe Biden in 2016 and 2020, Harris did not obsess over dismantling her rival's falsehoods or exposing his program or what she considers the administration's greatest successes. She seized every opportunity, from the opening statement, to distance and differentiate herself, to portray the Republican as a friend of the wealthy who abandons the middle class, but above all as someone furious, always angry, "anchored in the past" and with no plan for the future.
Trump is a force of nature, uncontrollable, unstoppable, as hurtful and disrespectful as he is entertaining in his speeches, with a unique talent in front of cameras and the public. "The best insulter in many generations," as one of his former Republican rivals put it. Trying to keep up with him is suicide. Engaging in his game is a sure defeat. And Harris avoided it at all times, choosing the topics where she could inflict damage ("Donald Trump was fired by 81 million Americans and he is struggling to accept it") without being reactive. Revealing a side of Trump that was unknown, after belittling her, underestimating her, and ignoring her until now.
When the moderators questioned her about her inconsistencies, contradictions, or the most sensitive issues, from inflation to immigration policy, Harris simply ignored the question and activated her plan: baiting. Trump started off calmly, but every time his opponent pricked his fragile vanity, he took the bait. Instead of delving into his weaknesses and inconsistencies, instead of pressing on what she only mentioned at the end, "why hasn't he done it before" if he is in power, he became defensive and blurred.
Moderators' interventions
Each response became visceral, forcing the moderators to cut off the former president or correct his statements. Harris succeeded by stating that people who attend the billionaire's rallies leave before they end out of boredom. She did it again by reminding that important figures of the Republican Party, like former Vice President Dick Cheney, are voting for her. And she hit a nerve by using economists from Trump's alma mater against his policies or stating that "world leaders laugh at Donald Trump and think he is a disgrace."
From calmness, it escalated to shouting, accelerated speeches. One tantrum after another defending that his rallies "are the best in history" or that "many professors say my economic plan is extraordinary." Personal attacks against her or Biden "that poor weak and pathetic man" and unbelievable lies. On three occasions, the ABC moderators addressed the millions of viewers to clarify that "there is no law in any state in the USA that allows killing newborns," in response to Trump's recurring claim that Democrats allow "not abortion, but the execution of born babies."
They had to intervene a second time to emphasize that according to all authorities, there have been no reported cases of any communities eating pets after the former president repeated and even amplified the falsehood that Haitian immigrants "are eating people's dogs and cats" in Ohio. And once more to make it clear that Trump lost the 2020 elections and that none of the more than 60 lawsuits initiated by Republicans in different states have reached a different conclusion, after Trump insisted that he won those elections and will never acknowledge his defeat.
This fact-checking and correction attitude deeply irritated his campaign, which after the first hour of the debate began to strongly criticize the network for bias. Trump himself claimed at the end, on social media and even in person, when he unexpectedly descended to the press room, something unprecedented, and as a demonstration that a reaction was necessary to contain the damage, that it had been "the best debate" of his life and that it was particularly remarkable since "it was three against one," referring to the ABC moderators.
The face-off ultimately presented two completely opposite visions, two irreconcilable styles, one positive and the other negative. She spoke of future opportunities while he denounced the nation's decline, the sinking, and the current crisis. Trump's central message is that his presidency was the best in history and the next one will be even better, although when pressed for specifics, such as in Healthcare, he said that he has "sketches, concepts of a plan" and not a concrete one because that is done once in power.
He remained anchored in the past, including the months following the 2020 defeat. "We are a failed nation, in serious decline. The world is laughing at us, we have no leader, we are clueless," he said in his speech, attacking "the worst vice president in the country's history."
Harris's message, which never resembled the "radical leftist and Marxist" caricatured by Republicans, was one of "hope." "I am not Joe Biden, and clearly I am not Donald Trump. I propose new leadership that exalts optimism instead of always being angry," she concluded after one of her rival's irritable responses. "We need to turn the page. We have two visions of the country, one for the future and one for the past that wants to drag us down. But we are not going back," she emphasized in her final statement.