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Following Tuesday night’s presidential debate between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris, we offered a take that turned out to be a bit controversial. We suggested that the former president, who had proclaimed himself to be the “greatest debater,” had lost simply by (predictably) being himself. However, we also noted that the debate seemed to have been a squandered opportunity for Harris.
Nobody other than die-hard Trump supporters disagreed with the first part (and plenty of those privately also acknowledged that the former president crashed and burned).
It’s the second part where opinions seem to diverge.
The pundit class appears to be in total agreement that Harris was amazing. And there are some things she undoubtedly did well, which we also pointed out: She baited Trump into going off the rails, and she did very well on some topics like abortion, health care, democracy, and the former president’s authoritarian tendencies.
However, debates aren’t about what pundits think, and her main job wasn’t to rattle Trump and make him seem angry and crazy. He is angry and crazy, and Americans already know this.
Instead, debates are about influencing the tens of millions of potential voters who are watching, and, because many of them still don’t really know Harris, for her to introduce herself to them, to inspire them, and to lay out her vision for how she will make their lives better.
And that is where she could have done much better.
Instead of appearing to be authentic, the vice president spent too much time and effort on working prepared talking points and phrases into her remarks, and on baiting Trump into… well, being Trump.
Here is an example: After the former president bizarrely repeated the debunked rumor that immigrants were stealing and eating the pets of true-blue Americans in Ohio, she should have gone back to pointing out that Trump had torpedoed bipartisan immigration legislation for personal gain.
“I can’t help but notice that the former president didn’t answer the question, and instead just offers more weird conspiracy theories,” she should have said. “But I think the American people deserve a response, and I’m happy to yield back my time so he can explain why he wanted Republicans to kill this compromise, which would have made our border significantly more secure. Make no mistake about it, as president, I will work hard to sign that law.”
That answer keeps Trump riled up, it blames him for the situation at the border, and it lays out what Harris plans to do.
Instead, she talked for two minutes about how she has the support of 200 Republican officials and aides, and then cited some of the bad things former White House officials and cabinet members had to say about Trump.
That’s an almost total non-sequitur, and it just seemed too rehearsed.
This happened throughout the night. Time and again, Harris did not answer questions because she seemed more intent on shoehorning certain talking points into her responses.
For example, when she was asked about her changing positions on issues like fracking, an assault weapon buyback program, or decriminalizing border crossings, Harris launched into a lengthy discourse on everything from valuing the importance of home ownership to protecting Medicare.
And, of course, there was another dig at Trump.
“The values I bring to the importance of home ownership knowing not everybody got handed $400 million on a silver platter and then filed bankruptcy six times, is a value that I bring to my work to say we are going to work with the private sector and home builders to increase 3 million homes, increase by 3 million homes by the end of my first term,” the vice president said.
Again, that probably gets pundits excited (especially because Trump took the bait again), but it didn’t really help Harris introduce herself to voters… and it probably doesn’t help her image if she sounds too scripted and evades questions.
That is the opportunity she wasted.
Still, did she win the debate? Absolutely.
However, just like Trump in June when Biden delivered an abysmal performance, it’s a victory by default.
Back then, it’s not as though the former president was brilliant; it’s that Biden was so awful.
The same happened again last night. Yes, Harris was effective in a way that delighted pundits, and Trump was terrible.
But it remains to be seen how voters viewed the debate.
Therefore, we reaffirm the verdict from our initial take: What could have been an early knockout turned into a bruising 12-round bout that Harris ultimately won on points.
