Sparring on politics and personality, Kamala Harris and Donald Trump showcased their starkly different visions for the country on abortion, immigration, and American democracy as they met for the first time Tuesday for perhaps their only debate before November's presidential election.
The Democrat vice president moved repeatedly to get under the skin of the former Republican president, provoking him with reminders about the 2020 election loss that he still denies and derisive asides at his other claims. This, as he pressed his case that Harris is an extreme left-wing flip-flopper closely aligned with the failed policies of the Biden administration.
Harris not only tried to make the case that Trump is unfit for office but tried to use her answers in a way that seemed calibrated to provoke him into launching into one of the personal attacks that his advisers and supporters have tried to steer him away from. In one moment, Harris turned to Trump and said that as vice president, she had spoken to foreign leaders, "And they say you're a disgrace."
Trump again disputed his loss to President Joe Biden four years ago, when his efforts to overturn the result were followed by the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol breach. He has consistently argued that election fraud was at the root of the 2020 outcome.
"Donald Trump was fired by 81 million people," Harris said, "So let's be clear about that. And clearly he is having a very difficult time processing that."
Trump in turn tried to link Harris to Biden and what he characterized as failed Biden policies on inflation, immigration and more. He questioned why she hadn't acted on her proposed ideas while serving as vice president. He focused his attacks on Harris over her assignment by Biden to deal with the root causes of illegal migration.
He repeatedly dismissed her and Biden as weak, and cited the praise of Hungary's nationalist prime minister Viktor Orbán to show that he is a widely respected by leaders around the world, saying Orbán calls him the "most feared person."
The high-pressure matchup after a tumultuous campaign summer offered Americans their most detailed look at a campaign that's been dramatically changed. The vice president moved to Democrats' case against Trump more sharply than Biden did when he met Trump in June, linking the former president to GOP efforts to restrict abortion access and accusing him of undermining the nation's democracy.
The first early ballots of the presidential race will go out just hours after the debate, hosted by ABC News. Absentee ballots are set to be sent out beginning Wednesday in Alabama.
Saying it's "time to turn the page," Harris delivered an appeal to Republicans and independents turned off by Trump's style and his alleged efforts four years ago to overturn the 2020 presidential election, saying there's a place in her campaign for them "to stand for country, to stand for our democracy, to stand for rule of law and to end the chaos."
Trump repeatedly declined to say that it was in the best interest of the U.S. for Ukraine to win its war against Russia. Harris said it was an example of why America's NATO allies were thankful he was no longer in office, as she and Biden have sent tens of billions of dollars to help Kyiv fend off Russia's invasion.
Harris seemed to smirk as Trump pressed the claim, widely embraced on the right, that migrants are "taking jobs that are occupied right now by African Americans and Hispanics."
"Talk about extreme," Harris responded, when Trump repeated disputed claims that immigrants in Ohio are eating their neighbors' dogs and cats.
The candidates met in a small, blue-lit amphitheater converted into a television studio, with no live audience, meaning there was no rowdy applause, cheers or jeers. The intimate setting — with the candidates' lecterns positioned less than 10 feet from each other — belied the contentious debate to follow.
Harris repeatedly shook her head derisively as Trump spoke, occasionally staring at him with a hand on her chin, while Trump seemed to avoid looking toward the Democrat.
A disciplined Trump hewed closely to his rally talking points and attacks.
As Harris seemed to try to interject during one of his responses, Trump replied, "I'm talking now, sound familiar?" harkening back to a moment when shut down an interruption from then-Vice President Mike Pence.
Harris sharply criticized Trump for the state of the economy and democracy when he left office, as the COVID-19 pandemic ravaged the nation and after his supporters stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, in a bid to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
"What we have done is clean up Donald Trump's mess," Harris said. She opened her answer by saying she expects voters to hear "a bunch of lies, grievances and name calling" from her GOP opponent during their 90-minute debate.
Trump, meanwhile, quickly went after Harris for abandoning some of her past liberal positions in a sort of grand and disingenuous flip-flop, and said: "She's going to my philosophy now. In fact, I was going to send her a MAGA hat." Harris smiled broadly and laughed.
Harris has sought to defend her shifts away from liberal causes to more moderate stances on fracking, expanding Medicare for all and enacting mandatory gun buyback programs — and even backing away from her position that plastic straws should be banned — as pragmatism, rather than hypocrisy or political calculation.
As the debate opened, Harris walked up to Trump's lectern to introduce herself, marking the first time the two had ever met. "Kamala Harris," she said, extending her hand to Trump, who received it in a handshake — the first presidential debate handshake since the 2016 campaign.
Harris also zeroed in on one of Dems' biggest talking points, laying the end of national abortion rights at Trump's feet for his role in appointing three U.S. Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe v. Wade and leaving more than 20 states in the country with what she called "Trump abortion bans."
Harris gave one of her most impassioned answers as she described the ways women have been denied abortion care and other emergency care and said Trump would assign a national abortion ban if he wins.
Trump emphatically declared it "a lie," and said, "I'm not signing a ban and there's no reason to sign a ban."
The Republican has said he wants the issue left to the states to decide, in contrast with any federal directive.
Harris used a question about her plans to improve the economy by saying she would extend the tax cut for families with children and a tax deduction for small businesses while attacking Trump's plans to impose broad tariffs as a "sales tax" on goods that the American people will ultimately pay.
Trump quickly retorted: "I have no sales tax. That's in incorrect statement. She knows that."
Trump, who is trying to paint the vice president as an out-of-touch liberal while trying to win over voters skeptical he should return to the White House continued to call Harris a "Marxist," and said "Everyone knows she's a Marxist."
Trump, 78, has worked hard to adapt to Harris, 59, who is the first woman, Black person and person of South Asian descent to serve as vice president. The Republican former president has at times resorted to invoking racial and gender stereotypes, frustrating allies who want Trump to focus instead on policy differences with Harris.
Harris hit Trump on one of his biggest sources of pride, his freewheeling campaign rallies. Harris noted how at the events, Trump will sometimes muse on "fictional characters like Hannibal Lecter" and whether "windmills cause cancer," and then said that if you watch his events "you will also notice that people start leaving his rallies early out of exhaustion and boredom."
"The one thing you will not hear him talk about is you. Your needs, your dreams and your desires."
Trump used his next question to respond by accusing Harris of having no one attending her rallies except the people that he claimed she'd bused in and paid to be there.
"She can't talk about that. People don't leave my rallies. We have the biggest rallies, the most incredible rallies in the history of politics," he said.
In rapid fashion after the June 27 debate between Trump and Biden, the incumbent bowed out of the race after his disastrous performance, Trump survived an assassination attempt and bothsides chose their running mates.
The debate subjected Harris, who has sat for only a single formal interview in the past six weeks, to a rare moment of sustained questioning.
Trump at one point launched into an attack on Biden, questioning his mental acuity by making the claim that Biden "doesn't even know he's alive."
Harris quickly tried to turn it around to make Trump look less than sharp.
"First of all, I think it's important to remind the former president, you're not running against Joe Biden. You're running against me," she said.
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