On Tuesday, September 10, the two main candidates running for President in the upcoming election. Vice President Kamala Harris and Former President Donald Trump, not only met for the first time – but did so on a debate stage in a debate hosted by ABC News, and for the first time, streamed live on Hulu and Disney+ – a first for any presidential debate.
The debate was, at its core, different. For starters, microphones were muted when it wasn’t the respective candidate’s turn. Also, there was no live audience present for the debate – the same was true for the debate between Trump and Biden in July. The reason for this was because of the rules that were negotiated and agreed upon between Trump, Biden, and ABC back when Biden was still running for re-election.
Since then a lot has happened, of course. The elephant in the room was that President Biden ended his re-election campaign and instead endorsed Vice President Harris as the Democratic nominee and America’s next President. After suspending his candidacy on July 21, ownership of his existing campaign and finance committees were transferred over to Vice President Harris, with the Biden Victory Fund and Biden for President campaigns being renamed to Harris Victory Fund and Harris for President just a couple hours after Biden’s announcement.
Once Harris became the presumptive Democratic nominee just 12 days after Biden’s announcement, she began to press on the topic of debating Trump. Harris’ campaign asked for a live audience on her behalf and opposed muting microphones during the debate – a position that Trump had previously been against. However, Trump did not agree to any new rules or rule changes, initially passing up on the opportunity to debate her on the previously planned September 10 debate on ABC. Trump eventually agreed to debate Harris – on the condition that all existing rules were kept intact for the debate – which Harris agreed to.
Harris however rejected a September 4 debate on Fox News, with the network instead converting the time slot into a town hall-style event for Trump, which was hosted by Sean Hannity in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Harris cited her distrust of the Fox News network for her denial of debate on the network.
But when it comes to the debate on ABC, both candidates showed up – and it began with Harris walking over to Trump, introducing herself and shaking hands with the former President. Throughout the evening, the candidates argued back and forth, interrupted one another and the moderators, and continuously went off topic – while both candidates referred to their policy platforms that are already publicly accessible. With not much new being revealed during the debate, it is uncertain what the long-term effects of this debate might be.
However, we might be able to get our first glimpse at the impacts of this debate. In an overnight poll conducted by YouGov, Harris was deemed the winner of the debate – with 43% of those polled stating she won, and 28% stating that Trump won – with 30% still undecided at the polling time. In a poll conducted by SSRS, the results were Harris winning the debate with 63%, and Trump with 37%. What we can gather with this early polling is that the debate proved to benefit the Harris campaign. While the long-lasting impacts of the debate are still uncertain, it can be predicted from the early polling by YouGov and SSRS that this could prove to be a net positive for Harris’ chances in November.
And even though this debate could have a large impact on this election, it is important to keep in mind that there are still about 50 days until the election on November 5. The deadline to register to vote in New Jersey is October 15, whether you register online, in-person, or by mail. Early voting goes from October 26 until November 3. Every House seat in New Jersey is up for election, along with one US Senate seat, President & Vice President, and locally – three seats on the Roxbury School Board are up for election.
