Since 2015, the formula has never changed: Donald Trump taps into the endless resources of fears and fabrications. A local news item can be transformed into a national cause, an unfounded rumor into a fraudulent demonstration. The televised debate between the Republican presidential candidate and his Democratic rival Kamala Harris, on Tuesday, September 10, on ABC, demonstrated this once again.

The first instance concerned abortion. Faced with the massive mobilization of the left on this societal issue since the Supreme Court's June 2022 decision abolishing this right at the federal level, the Republicans have been clinging to a lie: That the left supports abortions after birth. On Tuesday, Trump claimed that Tim Walz, Harris's running mate, believes that "abortion in the ninth month is absolutely fine," as is "execution after birth." In June, on Fox News, he had already declared that "they have some states passing legislation where you can execute the baby after birth. It’s crazy." No state, of course, has passed such legislation.

The Guttmacher Institute, a leading authority on monitoring reproductive rights, estimated that 1,037,000 abortions have been performed in the country in 2023, despite bans in 14 states. Of these, 94% involved pregnancies in the first 13 weeks. But Republicans caricature Democratic positions by denouncing abortions performed out of pure convenience, à la carte, with no concern for the unborn baby. This position is both cynical and insensitive to the tragedies experienced by women who are forced to have late-term abortions.

The second fabrication stirred up by Trump himself concerns the question of gender. The former president claims that minors could undergo surgery under the influence of their schoolteachers, driven by the woke ideology, and this without their parents' knowledge. He is part of the cultural war launched by the Christian nationalist right, of which Florida Governor Ron DeSantis was one of the standard-bearers.

Speaking recently in Washington to the Moms for Liberty organization, Trump declared, "The transgender thing is incredible. Think of it; your kid goes to school, and he comes home a few days later with an operation. The school decides what’s going to happen with your child. And you know, many of these childs [sic] 15 years later say, 'What the hell happened? Who did this to me?' They say, 'Who did this to me?'" Not true. Puberty blockers, hormone treatment or operations are extremely rare for minors and all these treatments require written parental consent.

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