Debating has long been a Kamala Harris strength. It resembles courtroom argument, a core part of her career as a prosecutor. A debate helped her win her first statewide race in California, 14 years ago. In her only vice-presidential debate four years ago with Mike Pence, polls showed that she won.
And she certainly seemed to win last night’s debate with Donald Trump.
She was calm and forceful and repeatedly baited Trump into looking angry. As Trump told lies — about Obamacare, inflation, crime, immigrants eating household pets and more — she smiled, shook her head and then called him on the lies. She often looked directly at him or the camera; he seemed unwilling to look at her and looked mostly at the moderators.
During the debate, prediction markets shifted a few points toward Harris. Many political analysts, including conservatives, also judged Harris to be the winner — two-and-a-half months after many of those same analysts said Trump had trounced President Biden in their debate:
“Y’all, this is not going well for Trump. Don’t get mad at me for saying so,” Erick Erickson, the conservative commentator, wrote on social media. He also accusing the moderators of being biased against Trump — a common Republican argument last night. (The Times’s media correspondent analyzed the moderators’ performance.)
“I think she’s winning this. She comes across as normal, clear, and strong. Trump can’t land a blow — he is blustering and unfocused,” Rod Dreher, the Christian conservative, wrote.
“Trump looked old tonight,” Chris Wallace, the longtime Fox News host who now works for CNN, said.
At least one person who isn’t a political analyst also seemed influenced by the night. “Like many of you, I watched the debate tonight,” Taylor Swift wrote on social media afterward. “I will be casting my vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz.”
Will it matter?
There are a couple of important caveats.
First, Harris didn’t have a perfect night. She often ignored the questions from ABC’s moderators — like the opening question about whether Americans are better off than four years ago, as well as questions about her changed positions on fracking and other subjects. She recited her talking points instead.
She made a few false or misleading statements (though many fewer than Trump), including about the unemployment rate when he left office. She described her policies in ways that weren’t always easy to understand. In Trump’s closing statement, he parried her many promises by pointing out that she has been vice president for three-and-a-half years and asked, “Why hasn’t she done it?”
Second, it is uncertain how much Harris’s strong overall performance will matter. “Hillary Clinton also won the debates against Donald Trump,” Julia Ioffe of Puck News noted. The same prediction markets that shifted toward Harris last night continue to show the election as a tossup. The debate’s impact will become more evident as new polls emerge in coming days. But Harris’s campaign seemed very pleased with how last night went.