Trump allies do damage control as Harris rides fresh momentum post-debate

After a day spent processing the impact of Tuesday night's presidential debate, Donald Trump and Kamala Harris will be back on the campaign trail today. Harris will hold two rallies in North Carolina and has dispatched top surrogates to Michigan, Nevada and Arizona today. Her campaign also releasing a series of TV ads highlighting some of her top moments from the debate as they try to capitalize on momentum from what many saw as a big victory for her. Trump will be in Arizona today for his first post-debate rally. CNN sources say even Trump's staunchest allies say the debate was, at best, a tie. Let's get some analysis now of what both campaigns are doing. I'm joined by CNN politics senior reporter Stephen Collins, and great to see you, Stephen. All right. So you're reporting that Trump allies are launching a frantic clean up after his dud of a debate performance. In what way? Really interesting yesterday. If you listen to any conservative media, there was a coordinated campaign to the effect that the debate was rigged, that ABC news was, biased and unfair, that it fact checked Trump and didn't do the same to Kamala Harris to some extent. And that was true. Although at the same time, Harris didn't produce the same scale of lies and falsehoods that were contained in almost every answer, by the Republican nominee. So I think that's what you're seeing happening. whether it's going to be successful in convincing swing state voters, those movable, voters that could decide the election, the they didn't see what they actually saw on, the debate night, which was that Trump had a very bad night. it seems unlikely, but the interesting thing is that, nobody in Trump's orbit, and this is a testament to his power of personality, is able to come out and say, well, we had a bad night, but we'll do better next time if there is a next time. That tells you something about the whole Trump has over the Republican Party. meantime, Harris I mean, she's launching an aggressive, new phase with ads and appearances. What is the vice president about to do? Yeah. The campaign is saying that well, we're moving to an aggressive new stage. I think that's what exactly what you would expect him to do seven weeks before the election. crank up the pace of rallies, perhaps do more, off the record, appearances, as I call them, you know, going into shops and cafes, getting the footage of the candidate meeting people. We're going to see more trips to swing states. she follows up, her trip to North Carolina with several stops in Pennsylvania, which is absolutely a must win state if she's going to get to the white House. So I think you'll see a greater intensity. The question is, after, that debate where she did well, is she going to start doing more major media interviews where she could get into situations where she actually gets more scrutiny than Trump was able to bring to bear in his underperforming debate on Tuesday night. that is something to watch. I think they'll still be very careful to make sure that the message, is sharp and perhaps a little constrained. They don't want to give Trump anything he can seize upon, to try and stem her momentum that she has coming out of the debate. and then off a new endorsement from one of the world's biggest stars, Taylor Swift. I mean, how is the Harris campaign planning to attract younger voters to actually get them to the polls? I think that was something that campaign, the Swift endorsement, had been hoping for for some time. It was interesting the way that the timing was coordinated. So she came out of that debate and she got another big headline. I think it was another attempt to try to, almost play with Trump's head to get him annoyed and angry, as happened, during the debate, because the Harris campaign thinks that when the president former president feels like that, he does things that, make his situation even worse. I would look, I think to, lots of events in universities, as we get closer to the election, I think it's still unclear how directly Taylor Swift, will get involved in this, but it clearly is something that the the campaign would welcome. One thing which they really, do not want to happen is a resurgence of those demonstrations that we saw at a lot of campuses in the early summer, by pro-Palestinian supporters who are angry about the, Israeli operation in Gaza. If that happens, that could really, offer an opening to the Trump campaign and complicate, the outreach to students who, generally they vote Democratic, but they're quite difficult to get to the polls. All right. Stephen Collins and always great to see you. Thanks so much. right. Joining us now to talk about all this Jackie Kucinich, CNN political analyst, Washington bureau chief for The Boston Globe. Jackie, good morning. Good morning. Happy to have you here to start us off this morning. So the race, we're settling back into the final stretch of this race with both, Harris and Trump planning to campaign in battleground states. We learned that there were 67 million people that tuned into this debate. That's a 30% jump from the number who tuned in in June. That's a lot of people who saw President Trump struggle. But the fundamental question still remains whether or not this is going to fundamentally matter in what is ultimately going to be a very close race. So I think some of the issues that were discussed will matter. you're right. Anyone who who, tuned into that race, probably didn't, didn't end up coming away with, new view of the former president. We'll put it that way. But I keep on focusing on the issue of abortion. That was something one of the few things that actually was substantively discussed during that debate. And, unlike President Biden, Vice President Harris really does have a clear message on that issue. It's something that we know has moved votes in prior elections and so that is that that is something that I think potentially could, could change. Well, you know, and it's worth just stopping to remember that this is going to be our first presidential election since the fall of Roe versus Wade. We have some information, obviously, about how voters have reacted to this at the ballot box. We know that when it's a ballot initiative, it's just a question about abortion policy. People seem to be overwhelmingly siding. And and that is in swing states. There are some of those in swing states, right. Like Arizona, for example, has an initiative like that on the ballot. but we've also seen it we saw it help Democratic candidates in 2022, in the midterm elections, in blunting what many thought was going to be a red wave. There is a big question to me about how it impacts presidential politics, but it's this giant X factor that we've never seen before. Absolutely. Right. And but we've but we have seen as you as you rightly mentioned, we've seen these ballot initiatives. I think they have a perfect record at this point. They have passed in every state, no matter, you know, red or blue. But the true test is presidential politics, whether it will will people vote cross ballot? That's an open question. But in these critical swing states, you mentioned Arizona. I know Democrats are optimistic that that will bring that will drive more turnout for, you know, potentially Democratic candidates on down down ballot. Yeah. For sure. so, let's take a look at what some Republicans are saying about how Donald Trump performed, in his debate. it's not that the reviews were not great. Watch. Vice President Harris clearly won the debate in terms of delivery. Her Polish, her organization and her preparation. I know the president listed several people that he had fired during his administration. He may want to add to that the people that prepped him for the debate last night, he it was the land of missed opportunities. I don't think you should say stuff that maybe may make it harder for people to vote for you. So some pretty blunt assessments. There are RFK junior, obviously an independent, not a Republican, but now a Trump supporter. acknowledging what a lot of people could plainly see when you show up in a spin room, which is, you know, where usually each candidate, each campaign has their people come out and talk about how much they win. When the candidate shows up in the spin room, you know, they didn't have a good night. That usually does not happen at these events. And listen, I don't think you could objectively, as a Republican, look at that debate. Certainly the ones I spoke to yesterday and say, yes, talking about eating immigrants, eating cats and dogs is really where we want to be as a party. No, they wanted Trump to be able to really take apart, Vice President Harris and really focus on some of the her flip flops, some of the, the issues that did not happen because he took the bait again and again and again. All right. Jackie Kucinich for us this morning, Jackie. So grateful to have you.