The first presidential debate of 2024 took place last Tuesday, September 10th, and people paid attention. Over 67 million people tuned in because it was a debate for the history books. It was held between the former president, Donald Trump, and the current Vice President, Kamala Harris. The debate was held under moderators David Muir and Linsey Davis from ABC News studio. Trump was trying to prove his prowess against a new political opponent, whereas Harris took this as her chance to introduce herself to viewers and to show her policies and stances. Following are the main issues and topics the candidates spoke about on the debate stage.

Economy 

The moderators started the debate off with the broad question, “When it comes to the economy, do you believe Americans are better off than they were four years ago?” 

Harris started her two-minute response by talking about her plans to help the middle class. She hopes to help families by giving them a $6,000 tax cut when they start having children and a $25,000 down payment to people buying a house. Harris also spoke about how she plans to look at the backbone of American society and help entrepreneurs by offering a $50,000 tax deduction for startup businesses.  

Trump responded to one of Harris’s points called, “The Trump sales tax,” by clarifying that it’s not a sales tax. He aims, rather, to put larger tariffs on other countries so that they could pay America back for the things the United States has done for them. He then compared how the economy looked under his presidency to the current economy under Joe Biden and Harris’ presidency. In regards to inflation, Trump comments that during his own term, products were at a 21% increase, but now under Biden’s term, they “are 50, 60, 70, and 80% higher…” 

Abortion 

To introduce the topic of abortion, the moderator remarked that Trump stated that he is proud to be the “most pro-life president in American history.” Trump then brought up the idea of abortion in the ninth month, saying that Harris’ vice presidential pick, Tim Walz, believes, “execution after birth – it’s execution – no longer abortion because the baby is born, is okay.” Trump did also state that, “I believe in the exceptions for rape, incest, and life of the mother.” 

Harris strongly believes that women deserve the choice to decide what to do with their bodies. She brought up the idea of faith, which she believes does not have to be given up to support abortion. She states, “The government and Donald Trump, certainly, should not be telling a woman what to do with her body.” She concluded by saying, “I pledge to you, when Congress passes a bill to put back in place the protections of Roe V. Wade, as president of the United States, I will proudly sign it into law.” 

Trump responded by saying he is not signing a federal ban because abortion legislation is now in the control of state governments. He continues to explain that this is what the majority of people wanted despite political party differences. 

Immigration and Border

Immigration and Border Security was opened up as topic three in Tuesday’s debate, although both candidates had mentioned it during discussions of earlier topics. Harris began by going over a previous bill she had supported under Biden’s presidency. This bill, made by some of the “most conservative members of Congress,” would support people working at the border, prevent fentanyl from entering the United States, and would put more resources into prosecuting all kinds of traffickers. 

Trump began by warning that if Harris becomes president, “America will become Venezuela on steroids,” and continued to say that countries will go into World War III because the current office is letting millions of people come into America. He then made one of the most memorable comments of the evening and said, “They are eating the dogs. The people that came in, they are eating the cats. They are… They are eating the pets of people who live there. This is what’s happening to our country and it’s a shame.” In this case, he referred to the immigrants who came into the United States when Harris was Vice-President. The moderators corrected Trump by saying that there had been no reports of the immigrant population abusing or eating animals in Springfield, the town which Trump claimed these events occurred in.

The moderators brought Harris and Trump back to the topic of immigration by stating the fact that Trump has previously said that he will use the National Guard, the US military, and local police to secure the border. Trump agreed, saying that is still his belief, and the moderator continued the conversation by asking how Trump plans on getting the illegal immigrants, who are already in the United States, out. Trump answered by saying that the only reason there are so many illegal immigrants is because Democrats hold office. 

Both candidates continued to talk about immigration in other topic sections of the debate, repeating most of their previous arguments. One new argument that sparked viewers’ attention was made while discussing abortion. Trump said, “Now [Harris] wants to do transgender operations on illegal aliens that are in prison,” which was the only comment of the evening in regards to the LGBTQ+ community.

January 6th

The riot at the Capitol on January 6th  2021, a violent protest against the transition of power in 2020, was also questioned in the debate. A moderator asked former president Trump if he regretted how he acted during the incident in any way, leading Trump to explain that he was not to blame for what occurred. He claimed that he was not in charge of security, so it was not his responsibility to prevent what happened at the Capitol. In Trump’s opinion, the reason the violence got out of hand was Nancy Pelosi and the mayor of Washington D.C not doing their jobs correctly.

        Harris reminded the viewers how violent the attack on the Capitol was, letting citizens know that 140 officers were injured and some died, all under Trump’s leadership. She also referenced Charlottesville, an earlier incident where a mob were spreading antisemitic hate and carrying tiki torches. Harris noted that Trump said at the time, “There were fine people on each side,” despite the violence towards the anti-protestors. 

Foreign Policy

Israel-Hamas War

Addressing the Israel-Hamas war, one of the moderators started by asking Harris if she still agreed with her statement from nine months prior: that Israel has the right to defend itself, but should do more to protect innocent Palestinian civilians. Harris did agree with it and went on to talk about how a ceasefire deal must be reached, one where the hostages are released. She finished by stating that she thinks there needs to be a course made for a two-state solution where both Israelis and Palestinians have the same level of security. 

Trump, in turn, said that if he was president, the war “would have never started.” He claimed that Harris refused to meet with Netanyahu, the prime minister of Israel, because she was “at a sorority party,” and that she hates both Israel and Arabs. He ended by saying that Iran was too broke to fund terror groups, like Hamas, when he was president and that under Biden, Iran is now wealthy.

Russia-Ukraine War

Later in the evening, Trump was asked by a moderator if he wanted Ukraine to win the war against Russia. Trump responded, saying “I want the war to stop. I want to save lives.” He then talked about how Biden didn’t know what to say to Putin, the Russian president, and that Biden hadn’t spoken to him for two years. Trump also said that Biden didn’t know how to stop the war.

Harris responded to Trump by stating that he would end the war quickly by not standing in Putin’s way, which could be dangerous because, as Harris believes,  “Putin’s agenda is not just about Ukraine.”

Withdrawal from Afghanistan

At another point in the debate, one of the moderators asked Harris if she believed that she had any responsibility for the way that the withdrawal from Afghanistan played out, which involved 13 American soldiers being killed. Harris said that she agreed with Biden’s decision to withdraw, claiming it saved American taxpayers from paying $300 million a day for the war.

Trump followed this by stating that he told the head of the Taliban, “Don’t do it anymore, you do it anymore, you’re going to have problems,” referencing the harming of American lives. He then claimed that after saying this, no one was killed in the conflict for eighteen months. He ended by stating that the withdrawal was “in [his] opinion, the most embarrassing moment in the history of our country.”

Healthcare/Affordable Care Act

 As of 2023, one hundred million Americans had outstanding medical bills in 2023, which makes healthcare a topic of interest for the debate. The moderators started by asking Former President Trump, “Do you have a plan [for healthcare], and can you tell us what it is?”

Trump proceeded to call Obamacare “lousy,” especially during Obama’s presidency. “Do I save it, or do I let it rot? I saved it. I did the right thing, but it’s still never going to be great.” After that, Trump didn’t give a concrete plan besides Obamacare, despite his feelings on it: “What we will do is – we’re looking at different plans – if we can come up with a plan that’s going to cost our people, our population, less money and be better than Obamacare, then I would absolutely do it. But until then, I’d run it as good as it can be run.”

Turning attention to Harris, the moderator asked, “Vice President Harris, in 2017, you supported Bernie Sanders’ proposal to do away with private insurance and create a government-run healthcare system. Two years later, you proposed a plan that included a private insurance option. What is your plan today?” She started by making her position very clear in stating that she “absolutely supports private health care options,” but the maintenance and growth of the Affordable Care Act is her main priority. She mentioned that contrastingly, as president, Trump tried to get rid of the ACA 60 times. 

“We have allowed, for the first time, Medicare to negotiate drug prices on behalf of you, the American people. Donald Trump said he was going to allow Medicare to negotiate drug prices; he never did. We did,” said Harris, continuing to separate her ideas from Trump.

Change in Stance

Throughout this presidential election, many people feel as though Kamala Harris has changed multiple policy opinions despite saying her values have remained constant. One of the moderators questioned this, bringing up her old viewpoints on banning fracking, mandatory government buyback programs for assault weapons, and supporting decriminalizing border crossings. As vice president, Harris seemed to be in favor of these, but since has changed her mind.  

She first addressed fracking and claimed she has never wanted to ban fracking and never will. She explained her position as a need to invest in diverse energy sources to reduce reliance on foreign oil. In response, Trump talked about Harris’ values, saying that everything she claimed in her answer was false. “Fracking? She’s been against it for 12 years. Uh, defund the police. She’s been against that forever. She gave all that stuff up.” In total, he claims she changed twelve to fifteen of her policies.  

He called her a “radical left-liberal” and told the viewers that she would ban fracking and confiscate guns if elected. He also pointed out that he handled the fracking issue by providing jobs. He then claimed that he had gotten the oil business to a place no one had gotten it before, and that under Harris’ leadership fossil fuel usage will be dead and we’ll go back to windmills and solar energy. As Trump talked, Harris mouthed phrases like “that’s not true,” and “don’t lie.” 

Climate Change

The final topic for the debate was climate change, and although Harris and Trump had mentioned fracking briefly before, climate change as a whole hadn’t been discussed at all until the very end. The moderators stressed the importance of this topic to young voters, and opened the debate with a very simple question: what would you do to fight climate change?

Harris began by stressing that Trump has repeatedly called climate change a hoax and that’s not fair to people who have lost their homes and livelihoods due to climate change. She continued by stating what she has done for climate change as vice president, saying that her administration has invested a trillion dollars in clean energy while simultaneously increasing domestic gas production. To close her statement on climate change, she said that she believes that part of building a clean energy economy is investing in American-made products and automobiles.

Trump opened his argument by saying he will increase tariffs on cars coming into the United States from China because these cars are a danger to domestic auto workers. He continued, veering away from climate change, as he argued that President Biden and his son are collecting money from Ukraine and other countries. Trump then claimed that that is the reason Biden is so loyal to those countries and not the United States, stating that Biden is “selling our country down the drain.” The time then began to run out, before closing statements began.

This debate matters greatly to thousands of people across America (and the globe) and it truly was a chance for both candidates to state their beliefs. Harris cemented herself as an advocate for women and the middle class, while repeatedly saying she would build a country “for you.” Trump echoed many of his previously stated opinions on immigration, abortion and others, while doubling down on his slogan “Make America Great Again.” 

If you are eighteen or will be turning eighteen before November 5th, please make sure to register to vote, because your voice matters.

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In state: https://www.pavoterservices.pa.gov/Pages/VoterRegistrationApplication.aspx