Harris comes out swinging in a crucial presidential debate | Front Burner

[Music] hi I'm Jamie [Music] pone so the first and very possibly the last US presidential debate between Donald Trump and kamla Harris took place last night Keith bog is with me Keith spent years as a correspondent for the CBC in Washington he is one of my favorite people to listen to talk about American politics all right so let's get straight to the postmortem there is no shortage of stuff to talk about here so Keith uh Donald Trump effectively won the last debate by not having to do much at all really it it set in motion a whole set of circumstances that resulted in this debate tonight with KLA Harris and just walking into the debate what were the stakes for her well I guess they're kind of incredible um so much has happened in in the last couple of months to change the shape of the race and yet although Democrats are delighted with their last minute change of nominee and the way that she has caught on and improved their standings in the poll they are still not leading in the polls and they are still not the favorites to win this race and because she is still an undefined candidate in the race and that she was not uh terribly well known by Ordinary People in terms of the details of her person ality and and so on and her record she has really only had those last couple of months to try to catch up and the defining moments have for have been her convention and then of course tonight this was probably the most important moment for her in terms of defining herself and may well be the last time she gets such an opportunity and at the same time it was the most important opportunity for Donald Trump to Define kamelo Harris so that was really what the whole debate was about tonight it was about K Harris because there's so much about Donald Trump we already know and we've seen him on the political landscape for yeah you know we a decade now but she's still a bit of a mystery to many people well I'm dying to know you have watched so many of these debates and you know we're going to get into some of the issues in in a more granular sense in a moment but just generally how do you think she did well I thought the whole thing was riveting uh I thought it raced by um I thought there was lots of drama to it even from a substantive point of view including Donald Trump I think that it was a worthwhile debate in terms of just getting information out the candidates on where they stand so much of these things have to do with style a person's Behavior their warmth or lack of and all of that was present too and it's very important but it had all of those things together and I'd also like to say I thought for a change I don't have a lot of complaints about the moderators of the debate it was a very good debate it I think served the public well and I think that uh people who are wondering what kamla Harris is really like have a much better sense this morning now than they did 24 hours ago yeah I I was having a great time although I will I will say that as soon as the debate ended that the Republican pundits were coming on talking about how they thought the moderators were completely unfair to Trump the biggest I think failure for the country tonight was ABC yeah it's an embarrassment it's an embarrassment to journalism I mean it's on ISS you know that it was like three against one and they in multiple uh multiple points but before we get to that substance though just a little bit more on the style um or the strategy right because uh Harris it it did seem clear to me at least that she was trying to bait Trump she she did this several times you know I'm thinking for example right off the top uh she she started to get into his rally she talked about how people were bored at his rallies you will see during the course of his rallies he talks about fictional characters like Hannibal Lecter he will talk about windmills cause cancer and what you will also notice is that people start leaving his rallies early out of exhaustion and boredom and I will tell you the one thing and uh and just talk to me about how you you think that strategy generally played out because it wasn't just the rally stuff like this went there were there were multiple examples I think the rally stuff was probably the most obvious of it right where where we have known for years how sensitive Trump is about the size of his crowds and what a great Entertainer he is and she was really giv it to him right she stuck it right to him saying essentially saying you know he's a little bit nutty when he talks to his rallies and inviting people to go right like I thought that was a very clever tackle and I'm going to invite you to attend one of Donald Trump's rallies because it's a really interesting thing to watch speaking to the audience and saying I'm gonna invite you to go to a Donald Trump rally because then you'll get to see how kind of nutty he is and and how boring he is too and that's why people are leaving and man those things really get under his skin and he cannot hide it and he cannot resist responding he can't Bridge away from that and talk about what he should be talking about he just as you say takes the bait and starts going about his crds oh man first let me respond this to the rallies she said people start leaving people don't go to her rallies there's no reason to go and the people that do go she's busing them in and paying them to be there so 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 that's because people I think that that showed that she has a lot of skill in playing Donald Trump and Donald Trump just cannot help himself he cannot get out of his own way [Music] there was another moment uh where she picked a fight with him when she brought up his indictments essentially and then he went into this whole thing about uh her weaponizing the government vice president Harris in your last run for president weaponized please this is the one that weaponized not me she weaponized I probably took a bullet to the head because of the things that they say about me they talk about you know I think maybe another standout moment was when she talked about how like uh world leaders are always talking like smack about him and he he kind of really went off on that too Victor Orban one of the most respected men they call him a strong man he's a he's a tough person smart prime minister of Hungary they said why is the whole world blowing up 3 years ago it wasn't why is it blowing up he said because you need Trump back as president they were afraid of him China was afraid and I don't like to use the word afraid but I'm just quoting him China was afraid of him North Korea was afraid of him look at what's going on how would you characterize Trump's performance generally and you talked earlier about how his job was to try and Define her and and how did he do there well I mean maybe he did okay for his base but so much of it was playing to his base and maybe he still feels secure that he can win the election with only his Pace but for instance you mentioned you know his court cases and the indictments against him and how he was railing against the justice system as having been politicized and so on and there is an audience for that but it's an audience he already has and the question for me is really do you want to be spending that much time talking about the fact that you're a felon or that you have to face all of the indictments that there have coure cases ahead like where is the upside for Donald Trump in all of that except with his base who he already has but the the idea that he can stand there and proudly say how much he admires Victor Orban and how much Victor Orban admires him and how the world was a better place when all his chummy dictator friends uh had him as the President of the United States again I don't think that has broad appeal I don't think he helps himself with that but I don't think he can help himself when it comes to trying to control it and then how do you think he did when it came to trying to shake The Narrative around her you know part of me is reluctant to say because I don't want to feel as though I'm speaking for 300 million Americans or whatever adult population may have been watching that I've learned from covering many debates in Canada and in the United States that sometimes we we see more than we should in these debates because we are talking to each other all the time and we're so familiar with the subject and we have our own way of grading it and the public sees it very differently so when it comes to how well did he do in defining her I don't think he I mean clearly he wanted to Define her as Joe Biden that came up over and over again I've never thought that that is a particularly persuasive thing for him to do against somebody who is so completely and obviously not Biden she is Biden you know she's trying to get away from Biden I don't know the gentleman she says she is Biden the worst inflation we've ever had a horrible economy because inflation has made it so bad but I do think that um tying her to the Biden agenda and particularly through those kinds of things that make people ask themselves was I really better off four years ago than I am now and many people people would answer that in the affirmative yeah they do feel they were better off I think in those ways that was probably his most effective attack on her and also as a part of that you know in his summation at the end of it he said you know you got all these plans that you want to do you've had time to do them why didn't you yeah that's I think a very effective message as [Music] well I think that's a good segue to some of the specific issues that the candidates fielded questions on so on this question of of like were you better off four years ago that was really one of the first questions that was thrown at at Harris tied to the economy essentially and and you know generally how do you think that she did on this issue which is uh not a great one for her right um you know there's an inflation yeah cost of living crisis yeah it's hard to win on this issue I think the Biden Administration for a number of years has made the mistake of thinking that they could talk to the public about the economy in kind of macroeconomic wonky terms and that they would get it that they would they would be able to talk about inflation coming down and people would say oh great inflation's coming down but people aren't like that they experience inflation as the price of goods in the grocery store and the price of goods in the grocery store is not coming down the rate at which it's going up is coming down completely different thing and what she did I think effectively although I don't know whether you can ever be completely effective on this when you're dealing with the hand that she's got is that she at least identified with how people are experiencing the economy and she didn't talk down to them from in in an kind of academic desensitized way so I was raised as a middle class kid and I am actually the only person on this stage who has a plan that is about lifting up the middle class and working people of America I believe in she talked about them as a person who understands what it's like not to be able to afford the things that you used to be able to afford yeah on that macro level versus the fact that you just like can't pay your rent right um immigration and this Southern border unsurprisingly came up a lot right Donald Trump talked about it uh during segments where he wasn't asked about it Ashley babbett was shot by an outof control police officer that should have never ever shot her it's a disgrace but we didn't do this group of people that have been treated so badly I ask what about all the people that are pouring into our country and killing people that she allowed to pour in she was the Bazar remember that she was did you hear anything tonight from Trump on immigration that surprised you you know I I I kind of thought he'd go after it even more than he did I mean you're quite right that he bridged to it on a couple of occasions but I think he missed opportunities and I think it's an you know I think it's probably his most effective argument and he obviously like almost enjoys fear-mongering about the people who are coming across the border uh and painting them as the most uh Savage violent murderous people you could possibly imagine who will eat your pets if you let them right yeah yeah I'll just I'll just uh come in here for some uh clarification for people listening um there was this moment in the debate where where Trump essentially said that immigrants in Springfield Ohio were eating people's dogs and cats in Springfield they're eating the dogs the people that came in they're eating the cats they're eating they're eating the pets of the people that live there and this is what's happening and this is a a wild unsubstantiated claim that's been going around Trump said at some point I think that he saw it on TV that was unspecified where yeah it but it's been bolstered online by these kind of bizarre AI images of cats and trumps and you know his sons are are sharing this and yeah yeah so you know he was he was bringing this thing up and and the debate moderator said look you know this has been investig and there is no shred of evidence that any of that is true and he respond by saying I saw it on TV there have been no credible reports of specific claims of pets being harmed injured or abused by individuals within the Immigrant Community all I've seen people on television let me just say here this is the people on television say my dog was taken and used for food so maybe he said that and maybe that's a good thing to say there's a kind it's almost poetic that he would say that because he's the most TV president we've ever had right like he he exists in front of the TV too or in front of the TV camera right he has those two roles he's either on TV or watching TV we led to believe most of the time and then we we get to see like from his own mouth how important he thinks TV is compared to say factchecking or just knowing what you're talking about he he believed it was true because he saw it on TV yeah it was really I think uh one of the most bizarre moments or kind of most unhinged moments it felt like in in the debate um Harris push backed on him on immigration uh with a line that she's used uh you know Biden used it um they accuse him of killing this bipartisan Bill to address the Border uh and and do you think that was enough from her tonight to quell people's concerns around this well he doesn't have a good answer to that because it's true they did have a bipartisan agreement it was not an agreement Democrats would have supported in uh other contexts but they supported it because they were dep desperate to try to get the issue off the table and so they gave away a lot more than they would be accustomed to that virtually nothing that Democrats would want in in another context was available to them in that bipartisan Bill and yet even though it was supported by Republicans Trump worked hard quickly and effectively to make sure it did not pass and I think he clearly exposed himself as putting his own political interests ahead of that issue um but whether you can say that often enough and clearly enough to persuade people that he can't be trusted on this issue if it doesn't serve his self-interest I don't know uh but it's a not bad response to what is one of their what of the Democrats most vulnerable uh issue [Music] sets one issue that is a liability for for the Republicans and and for Trump is the issue of abortion and that of course came up uh during the debate it was it was a it was a good chunk of the night and and what do you make of kamla's performance on this question you know uh this is a strong issue for her and so how do you think that she did there it was the moment and you know it was fairly early in the debate it was after the economic questions they got straight to that and it was the moment that I saw her shift into a more comfortable gear for her where she knows the substance of the issue so well she doesn't have to worry about that but it was an opportunity for her to demonstrate great compassion a across a range of complex issues and speak for how women feel when facing a variety of different Healthcare challenges like that one does not have to abandon their faith or deeply held beliefs to agree the government and Donald Trump certainly should not be telling a woman what to do with her body I have talked with women around and I think it showed as I say her compassion and her comfort with the issue and I think a really strong ability to talk to people from the heart and in the course of that debate Trump keeps reverting to telling people what they think every legal scholar every Democrat every Republican liberal conservative they all wanted this issue to be brought back to the states where the people could vote and that's what happened happened now Ohio and everybody's supposedly happy I mean that's just obviously not true it's unclear to me why he would say such a thing and keep repeating such a thing other than I mean they often demonstrated fact that he can't ever say that he was wrong about anything right so he has to portray himself as being in control of this issue that he appointed the Supreme Court to do this and overturn roie Wade and overturning o roie Wade was a good thing majority of of women in America don't agree with him and he's telling them yeah actually you do agree with me I mean I think that's mansplaining you know I mean he he cannot he cannot win on this issue at all he cannot persuade people he's never been consistent on his own view because he hasn't really thought about the issue and that's been evident since he first uh entered politics and started answering questions almost nonsensically about abortion he hasn't thought about it and he should be smart enough to keep his mou shut until he has had time to think about it more seriously which I don't think is a day that will ever come well even during the B debate she pressed him on whether he would veto a National Abortion ban he just he won't he basically would wouldn't answer it but if I could just get a yes or no because your running mate Jen JD Vance has said that you would veto if you did come to your desk well I didn't discuss it with JD in all fairness uh JD and I I don't mind if he has a certain view but I think he was speaking for me but I really didn't look we don't have to discuss it because she'd never be able to get it just like she couldn't get student loans they couldn't get student loans they didn't even um I mean you you got to think that well what he's afraid of is is like he has the support of the evangelicals and the Christians who all are you know varying degrees of adding abortion some quite extreme yeah and he doesn't want to be the guy up there who's saying that yeah he would sign it and keep them happy and uh alienate a bunch of other people or that he would veto it and lose them and gain probably nothing I mean it's just never been a good issue for him he doesn't know how to handle it and the more he talks about it the worse he makes it I I I think this was probably her strongest portion of the night I mean to me at least just as a journalist watching [Music] it there was an another notable um amount of time in the debate devoted to the results of the 2020 election January 6 the riot at the capital and whether Trump still thinks he won in 2020 and just what stood out to you the most from those exchanges I think it was when KLA Harris said he's having difficulty processing it Donald Trump was fired by 81 million people so let's be clear about that and clearly he is having a very difficult time processing that I mean talk about an understatement right he he incited Oran against the capital because he was having difficulty processing the results of the election but that's what so many people feel right that that this is a real problem for Donald Trump that he cannot accept defeat he cannot process it properly and it leads to all kinds of unpredictable but quite dire consequences and I think she did that kind of neatly almost likly but it's a very serious thing that he can't accept the results of the last election there were several uh foreign policy questions Gaza Ukraine Afghanistan specifically came up how would you sum up the exchanges and answers from Harrison Trump there you know foreign policy issues are almost by definition nightmarishly complex Donald Trump has simple answers to them which can sound appealing or persuasive or convincing to the Right audience I'll speak to one I'll speak to the other I'll get them together that war would have never happened and in fact when I saw Putin after I left yeah he's like I would have just called up Putin and just that war would just be over be over call call upas and the War I mean it's completely completely nonsensical right but it's if you want to answer those if you want to treat those questions seriously it's really a difficult challenge to explain in position in simple terms in a limited amount of time when those issues have developed over in some cases uh decades in some cases longer are are extremely complex and uh most unfortunately there are probably no good answers no completely satisfactory answers otherwise it wouldn't we wouldn't be having the violence that we are seeing you know so you given a choice you can believe easy kind of nonsensical Solutions of one candidate and that can help you get to yourself through the night or whatever it takes but the truthful answer from the other candidate is not very nourishing satisfying because it's just not because the problems are complex because the answers aren't easy and none of them none of them can be had without sacrifice Keith any other standout moments you think are worth us discussing here you know I think there were a lot of standout moments in body language I heard somebody on television say you know you could get a lot of information out of this debate by turning the volume off hm and that comment really meant that that you would see somebody quite clearly comfortable serious able to smile laugh look Stern I'm talking about K haris and then somebody who looks looks angry and put upon and like he'd rather be anywhere else and I think if these are the broad kinds of feelings that people Come Away with I think that's a good thing for Harris whether it makes any difference at all in the end is that our last question is that where we're headed here yeah well let me go let me go straight to it because there are 56 days left in this election and what kind of sticking power do you think what happened tonight could have in November especially if this is the only time that the pair of them will face off so I don't know whether it can do comma Harris any good I think it's a great relief having gone through the Biden debate that she clearly didn't do herself harm but whether it matters even in a couple of weeks I mean we can't know that but to the extent it really was about Kamala Harris defining herself I think anybody who watched this tonight will know more about kamla haris a lot more about K Harris tomorrow than they did yesterday and I think what they saw was someone who's comfortable with the issues who speaks very very clearly in moving from complex issue to complex issue or thought to thought to thought and who can do who could do so with compassion understanding a touch of anger but not too much a touch of humor but not too much but a lot of humanity well I do want to note that when the polls start coming out in the next couple of days we might not even know if it was the debate or if it was the fact that a bit of breaking news here Taylor Swift Just endorsed kamla on her Instagram account with a picture of her and a cat so oh over's to who's to say I'm only half joking um about that uh anyways Keith this was great uh it was a lot of fun a really fun debate and then this was a really fun conversation so thank you so much thank you so much thank you for inviting all right that is all for today I'm Jamie Pon thanks so much for listening we'll talk to you tomorrow [Music]