Former US President and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump (left) speaks with US Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris during a presidential debate.

Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images

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Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images

Former US President and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump (left) speaks with US Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris during a presidential debate.

Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images

In the run-up to Tuesday night’s debate, the focus was on Harris. It would be her first-ever general election presidential debate, against an opponent who had been on stage before. Questions arose about whether she could counter Trump’s attacks, respond to criticism that she has little policy and, perhaps most importantly, whether she could come across as “presidential.”

According to Domenico Montanaro, senior political editor at NPR, the answer to all of those questions was yes. Despite a nervous start, he writes, “Harris was calm, in control and looking to the future, setting herself apart from both Biden and Trump.” A few notables about her performance:

• Harris was much more dominant than Trump during the debate, calling him “weak and wrong.” Harris responded to questions during the debate, but then pushed Trump in a different direction on several points and challenged him.
• She angered her opponent by saying that people at his rallies “quickly leave out of fatigue and boredom.” She also portrayed him as a bad businessman because he “inherited $400 million on a silver platter and then filed for bankruptcy six times.”
• Harris spoke about policies including tax breaks for parents and small businesses, and a first-time homebuyer credit for down payments. She also discussed her shift in position on fracking.

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Meanwhile, Trump was incoherent and lacking any serious insight into policy.

Montanaro notes, “If he were a boxer, Trump would be cut and bleeding during the fight, and at the end he would be knocked out.”

During the debate, Trump addressed conspiracies about the election, who is currently president (spoiler: Joe Biden), immigrants who he says come from “mental institutions and insane asylums,” and the debunked claims that immigrants eat pets.

Additionally, Harris put the former president on the defensive over his handling of the economy regarding tax cuts and tariffs, his employment numbers, his administration’s response to the pandemic and Jan. 6.

About the overthrow of Deera ruling that Americans still largely oppose, Trump said: “I did a great service by doing it. It took courage to do it. And the Supreme Court had great courage to do it. And I give those six justices enormous credit.”

After the debate, Trump went to the spin room to talk to reporters, which Montanaro said is not something one does after a good debate. There, he complained that the debate was “very unfair” and called it “three against one.”

Harris did everything right – and still managed to lose.

While Harris has arguably handled Trump better than anyone else in a debate, the political reality is that she can still lose. She has raised more than half a billion dollars, opened staff and field offices in swing states, and galvanized the Democratic base.

Still, Trump has a strong and committed base, and the seven swing states in question – Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, North Carolina, Georgia, Arizona and Nevada – are more conservative than the country as a whole.

Polls — including the NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll released yesterday — have shown that voters have more confidence in Trump than in Harris on the economy, immigration and the Middle East war.

This episode is produced by Tyler Bartlam. Edited by Dana Farrington, Emily Kopp, and Courtney Dorning. Our executive producer is Sami Yenigun.