What’s next after the Trump-Kamala debate

The first presidential debate between former president Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris took place last night on ABC News. The candidates talked about the economy, immigration, abortion, foreign policy and other major issues facing voters heading into November. We won’t get too much into winners and losers here, as you can head to The Spectator’s home page for all kinds of reactions. Here’s a quick sample: 

How Kamala Harris won the debate comfortably, Charles Lipson

ABC News is the big loser of the debate, Roger Kimball 

The Trump-Harris presidential debate failed the voters, Amber Duke

What we will cover is snap reactions from voters and what happens next. 

Initial polling shows that voters think Harris won the debate, but perhaps not as handily as media reactions last night suggested. CNN’s snap debate reaction had 63 percent of respondents saying that Harris won the debate and 37 percent saying that Trump won. However, this appears to be an underperformance for Harris. The only debate Trump ever “won” in the CNN poll was his June debate against Biden. In the first 2016 presidential debate, 62 percent of CNN respondents gave Clinton the win and only 27 percent said Trump won. That’s a wider victory margin than last night, and Clinton still went on to lose the election. 

CNN’s poll also showed that Trump gained two points with voters on who they trust more to handle the economy, and the network aired an unflattering moment for Harris as a voter in Pennsylvania said, “When facts come to facts, my life was better when Trump was in office.” 

JL Partners conducted an 800-person survey of independent voters; 49 percent of those surveyed said Harris won the debate while 43 percent said Trump won. But again, Trump comes out ahead on issues that matter most to voters. The independents said that Trump won on the economy, immigration, foreign policy and Israel, while Harris won on abortion, healthcare and democracy. 

“This wasn’t a knockout blow. The poll suggests her performance still left Americans in the dark about the content of her plans,” James Johnson, co-founder of JL Partners, said. 

So, a Harris victory doesn’t tell the whole story. And it seems the Harris campaign is aware that she probably didn’t do enough to convince voters that she is the right alternative to Trump, even if she has a better “temperament” or is “more presidential.” They put out a statement last night indicating they would like to schedule a second debate against Trump. 

What’s the likelihood that happens? Probably pretty slim. After all, Trump was burned by ABC’s moderators last night and would be doing himself a disservice to agree to debate on another mainstream media platform. Even Fox News is precarious, according to Trump. He said in an interview on Fox & Friends this morning that he wouldn’t want it to be moderated by Bret Baier or Martha MacCallum, instead listing Sean Hannity or Jesse Watters. That’s probably a no-go for the Harris campaign.

Even if they were to agree on terms, Trump doesn’t seem too keen on the idea of a “rematch.” 

“In the World of Boxing or UFC, when a Fighter gets beaten or knocked out, they get up and scream, ‘I DEMAND A REMATCH, I DEMAND A REMATCH!’ Well, it’s no different with a Debate. She was beaten badly last night,” Trump said on Truth Social. 

-Amber Duke

On our radar

MD SENATE RACE TIED The Maryland Senate race between Prince George’s County executive Angela Alsobrooks and former governor Larry Hogan is tied, according to internal polling by the National Republican Senatorial Committee. Their data also reportedly shows Tim Sheehy leading Jon Tester by four points in Montana. 

STOPGAP STOPPED Speaker Mike Johnson scrapped plans for a vote on a stopgap spending bill on Wednesday after previously promising he would bring the bill to the floor. Conservative members of the GOP are skeptical of any stopgap funding measure, even one that includes a bill requiring proof of citizenship to vote, while hawks opposed the bill for not increasing defense spending. 

A SWIFT ENDORSEMENT Taylor Swift endorsed Kamala Harris following last night’s presidential debate, stating that she had done her “research” and decided Harris was the best candidate on abortion and LGBTQ+ rights. She also took a shot at Trump’s vice presidential candidate, J.D. Vance, by signing her social media post, “Childless Cat Lady.” 

Andrew Cuomo faces the music

Andrew Cuomo found himself back in the spotlight this week, years after he resigned in disgrace as governor of New York. While Cuomo is rumored to be looking at a bid for either mayor of New York City or a return to his old job, he was in the nation’s capital yesterday appearing under oath before the Covid Select Committee to answer for his policies during the coronavirus pandemic.

Cuomo was specifically pressed on a March 25, 2020 mandate that forced nursing homes to accept Covid-19 patients. Some committee members said this policy caused thousands of unnecessary deaths, because it “resulted in the admittance and readmittance” — according to the Associated Press — “of more than 9,000 potentially Covid-positive individuals to nursing homes.”

Representative Mariannette Miller-Meeks said Cuomo was “defensive and shameless,” in a statement to The Spectator. He “deflected and blamed everyone, especially Trump,” she said.

“This committee must deliver real answers so it never happens again and I am here today to help in that mission,” Cuomo said in his opening statement. “Yes, I often vehemently disagreed with President Trump because from day one he willfully deceived the American people — denying Covid’s very real threat, telling us it was like the flu, it would go away by Easter, it was a Democratic hoax, use Clorox.

“His lies and denials delayed our response, let the virus spread, and this country never caught up,” he asserted. 

At one point, Representative Elise Stefanik asked Cuomo if he would turn around and apologize to the families in attendance who lost their loved ones during his handling of the pandemic. He refused to do so. 

“This is not about political theater,” Cuomo argued before Stefanik promised he would never hold elected office again. 

The hearing came after the subcommittee released a bombshell memo, which held “former New York governor Andrew Cuomo and his staff responsible for recklessly exposing elderly Americans to Covid-19 in New York nursing homes.” The memo detailed how New York’s former health commissioner, Howard Zucker, testified that Cuomo’s chief-of-staff stood off-camera with a white board during his state senate testimony and directed him to say that Cuomo’s office had nothing to do with the March 25 directive. The memo also said that Cuomo personally edited a report that severely undercounted the number of New Yorkers who died in nursing homes as a result of that policy. 

Cuomo’s presence placed Democrats in an awkward predicament; their party ousted him from his governorship over sexual harassment allegations, and not over his controversial Covid-era policies. Likely because other Democratic governors across the country, including now-vice presidential nominee Tim Walz, implemented similar policies. Cuomo’s spokesman, Rich Azzopardi, even cited Walz’s Covid policies in attempting to exculpate his boss.

Rather than press Cuomo in meaningful ways, the Democrats in attendance, led by Representative Jamie Raskin, talked almost exclusively about Trump. 

–Matthew Foldi

Ayotte approved in Tuesday primary 

Former New Hampshire senator Kelly Ayotte won the Republican primary in the state’s governor’s race and will face off against the Democratic former Manchester mayor, Angie Craig. This is the first open race for governor since 2016, since Governor Chris Sununu, who has one of the highest approval ratings of any governor in the country, opted not to run for reelection. 

Ayotte is running as the GOP successor to Sununu, who endorsed her back in August. Craig, who has been accused of mishandling Manchester’s homeless population and being too soft on crime, has called Ayotte an “extreme threat to reproductive freedoms” and “too dangerous for New Hampshire.” 

In other primary news, an Anchorage judge ruled yesterday that Democratic House candidate Eric Hafner, who is currently imprisoned in a different state, can remain on the ballot in November. The Alaska Democratic Party sought to remove Hafner, arguing that he is unqualified to run for office and afraid he would pull votes from their preferred candidate, Representative Mary Peltola. 

Hafner recently began a twenty-year sentence in a New York prison for threatening officials in New Jersey. 

Peltola is in a tight race against Republican Nick Begitch, a third generation Alaskan who has made the economy and energy central tenets of his platform. 

–Cockburn