Trump-Harris debate: the big takeaways if you couldn’t be arsed to watch it

Last night saw the second debate of the US presidential election, and the first since Joe Biden dropped out. This was an important opportunity for Kamala Harris to prove her mettle, and she delivered a solid performance. Beyond her answers to the questions themselves, she adopted exactly the right tact when it came to dealing with Trump. She was chuckling, tittering, sighing, rolling her eyes and shaking her head at him throughout – for the most part she seemed more amused than indignant, which was a good way of cutting him down to size. She made him seem like someone who is both dangerous and hard to take seriously.

When you compare her performance last night to Joe Biden’s disastrous flub a few months ago, it’s mind-boggling that anyone ever doubted it was a good idea to make her the candidate instead. This is true in general but it was particularly striking when it came to her defence of reproductive rights – she spoke about the subject with far more passion than Biden ever did, while Trump came across as flailing and dishonest. Here are some of the main takeaways and wildest moments from the debate, from transgender aliens to baby execution squads.

Anti-migrant hostility has always been the central plank of Trump’s platform, but last night he was even more unpleasant and obsessive than usual. He came across like someone who has been captured by the most unhinged corners of the online right, like his campaign is being staffed exclusively by Elon Musk reply guys. At several points throughout the debate, he talked about Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio (“they’re eating the dogs! They’re eating the cats! They’re eating the pets of the people who live there!”). This is deranged, conspiratorial nonsense, which was first cooked up by a neo-Nazi and then spread like wildfire on Twitter in the past week, and Harris rightly burst out laughing in his face for indulging it. When ABC’s moderator pointed out that – obviously – there is no record of this happening, Trump responded “I’ve seen people on television.” Well in that case it must be true!

Spreading these kinds of lies about a minority group is obviously racist and dangerous, but when the lies in question are this outlandish it also comes across as slightly desperate. Trump raving about migrants eating pets and “transgender operations on illegal aliens that are in prisons” might rile up his base, but we can hope that it’s all a trifle too insane for the average swing voter, or indeed anyone who doesn’t clock up 12 hours a day on Twitter. 

Credit where credit’s due, Harris absolutely cooked Trump when it came to the issue of reproductive rights, which is perhaps the Republican’s greatest electoral weakness. She was passionate and persuasive, telling a number of stories about the terrible ways that women and girls have been impacted since the overturning of Roe v Wade: 12-year-old victims of incest being forced to carry pregnancies to term; women living in poverty being forced to spend money they don’t have to travel out of state to access healthcare.

Trump, on the other hand, came across as dishonest to the point of absurdity. His defence of his own position on abortion was essentially a pro-democracy one: it’s about returning the decision to the states, instead of it being imposed by the federal government. He denied Harris’s warning that if elected he would introduce a national abortion ban and insisted that he supports exceptions for cases of rape, incest and where the mother’s life is at risk. When Harris spoke about the Republican’s attacks on IVF, he proudly claimed himself to be a “leader on fertilisation”.

But if he was trying to position himself as a moderate on these issues, he undermined this by making a series of bizarre claims about babies being “executed” after they are born. Needless to say, this is not something that happens, nor is it something which Tim Walz supports, as Trump also claimed.

Trump tried his best to depict Harris as one radical chica (she’s a Marxist who hates Israel, wants to defund the police, ban fossil fuels and confiscate people’s guns!!!) and she invariably retorted by pointing out that she is, in fact, very conservative. “Tim Walz and I are both gun owners, we’re not taking anyone’s guns away!” she said at one point. She bragged about her long-standing support for private healthcare. She bragged about overseeing the largest increase in domestic oil production in US history, which sounds like a less than ideal situation in the middle of a climate crisis. She bragged about having the support of investment banks like Goldman Sachs and over 200 former Republicans, including Dick Cheney, one of the worst architect’s of the Iraq War – neither of which are as flattering as she imagines. She restated her commitment, first made at the DNC, to ensuring that the US has “the most lethal fighting force in the world”.

Maybe this is just what you have to do to win an election in the US, but there was something dispiriting about her efforts to portray herself as fundamentally unthreatening to the status quo. If only Harris really was the rabble-rousing socialist of Trump’s imagination…

Bipartisan support for Israel is a core feature of American politics, so this was probably the least surprising outcome of the debate. Prior to voicing her unwavering support for Israel’s right to defend itself, Harris referred to the fact “women were horribly raped” on October 7 (some of these claims have been definitively debunked), while saying nothing about the ongoing, well-documented and systemic sexual violence being inflicted upon Palestinians by Israeli soldiers. In an attempt at balance, she also acknowledged that far too many Palestinian civilians have been killed and claimed, as she has done before, that she is “working around the clock” to secure a ceasefire deal. But considering she has ruled out imposing an arms embargo on Israel – which could end the conflict overnight – this is all just empty rhetoric.

Trump, on the other hand, claimed that if he was president, none of this would have happened – Hamas wouldn’t have dared to launch a military operation if he was in charge. He attacked Kamala for refusing to attend a speech by Netaynahu, accused her of hating Israel and suggested that, if she wins the election, Israel won’t exist in two years time. The worst atrocity of the 21st century wasn’t really granted much serious attention and it wasn’t long before the candidates descended into bickering, with Harris accusing Trump of sending “love letters” to Kim Jong-Un – just call him a f****t  next time and be done with it!

@aljazeeraenglish #US presidential candidates #KamalaHarris and Donald Trump clashed on foreign policy including Israel’s war on Gaza, during their presidential debate. #news #harris #trump #presidentialdebate #debate ♬ original sound – Al Jazeera English

He didn’t back down on this claim at all, and insisted that January 6 was actually Nancy Pelosi’s fault. As he did with every single question, he brought this one back to border security, claiming that the Democrats are deliberately importing people who can’t read and write in order to secure their votes. Harris accused Trump of being a laughing stock among leaders around the world, to which he responded that his good friend Victor Orban (the authoritarian prime minister of Hungary) actually likes him a lot – and hates her!

I believe that Kamala Harris deserves to be prosecuted for crimes against humanity, so I don’t think I’m particularly biased in saying that she did well at the debate. Everything I hated about her performance could easily play well among suburban swing voters in the US, who may be reassured by her positioning as a non-threatening, business-as-usual moderate. According to a survey conducted by The Washington Post, a group of uncommitted swing-state voters all thought Harris did better, regardless of how they plan to vote. Taylor Swift, who has so far held out on endorsing Harris, seemed to agree, describing her last night on Instagram as a “warrior” and a “steady-handed, gifted leader”.

The whole debate was light on policy: Harris’s main pitches were financial support for small businesses and young families (solid enough but fairly uninspiring) and Trump’s big policy seemed to be… inciting racial pogroms? But at the level of personality, she seemed far more stable, convincing and assured. Trump has lost it. There were a few flashes of the old magic, catty and a little camp: at one point, when Harris interrupted him, he said, “please, I’m talking now… does that sound familiar?” That did get a chuckle from me, I have to admit. But he mostly came across as whiny, erratic and aggrieved – a perpetual victim rather than a strong-man.

Still, thanks to the quirks of America’s electoral system, it’s much easier for a Republican to win an election (Trump lost the popular vote in 2016, yet still took the presidency.) There’s every sign that Trump is in his flop era, but it’s not time to relax just yet.