United States elections 2024: Donald Trump Wins
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Yommie
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Prosecutor v felon: US prepares for presidential debate between Harris and Trump
Kamala Harris, a former prosecutor, will go head to head with Donald Trump, a convicted criminal, in Philadelphia on Tuesday in their first – and maybe only – debate
www.theguardian.com
Prosecutor v felon: US prepares for presidential debate between Harris and Trump
Kamala Harris, a former prosecutor, will go head to head with Donald Trump, a convicted criminal, in Philadelphia on Tuesday in their first – and maybe only – debate
David Smith in Washington
Sun 8 Sep 2024 11.00 BST
It will be a study in contrasts around age, gender, race, temperament and policy. It will also be the first time in US presidential history that a former courtroom prosecutor will take the debate stage alongside a convicted criminal with the White House at stake.
Vice-President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee, has served as a trial lawyer, district attorney and state attorney general in California. Former US president Donald Trump, her Republican rival, has been convicted of 34 counts of falsifying business records to cover up a sex scandal.
The pair will go head to head in Philadelphia on Tuesday night in their first – and perhaps only – debate, just 75 days after Joe Biden’s dire performance against Trump triggered a political earthquake that ultimately forced him from the race for the White House.
Few expect such a transformative result this time. But Trump has his last best chance to end Harris’s extended “honeymoon” while the Democrat is aiming to prosecute her opponent’s glaring liabilities before tens of millions of voters watching on live television.
“It’s the first time Donald Trump is actually going to be cross-examined in front of the American people,” said Tara Setmayer, a former Republican communications director on Capitol Hill. “Kamala Harris’s career and experience as a prosecutor, attorney general and a senator is something that Trump should not underestimate in this debate.”
This will be Trump’s seventh appearance in a national general election debate, making him the most experienced debater in US presidential history. Against Biden in June he repeated familiar falsehoods that mostly went unchallenged. Harris is expected to be a more formidable opponent and could put Trump on the defensive over facts, policy and his conduct following the 2020 election.
Kamala Harris campaigns in North Hampton, New Hampshire, on Monday. Photograph: Brian Snyder/Reuters
The 59-year-old has not been shy about embracing her career in law enforcement so far in the campaign. A video at the recent Democratic national convention in Chicago declared: “That’s our choice. A prosecutor or a felon.” In a speech accepting the party’s nomination, Harris told cheering delegates: “Every day, in the courtroom, I stood proudly before a judge and I said five words: Kamala Harris, for the people.”
She has also been touting her record taking on predators and fraudsters, telling crowds across the country: “I know Donald Trump’s type!” Harris brought that experience to bear in her memorable 2018 cross-examination of Brett Kavanaugh during Senate confirmation hearings after Trump, then president, nominated him as a justice on the supreme court.
But she is unlikely to go after Trump directly over his convictions – or three other criminal cases still looming over him. When, at a rally in New Hampshire this week, an audience member shouted, “Lock him up!” Harris replied: “Well, you know what? The courts are going to handle that, and we will handle November. How about that?”
In May Trump became the first former US president to be convicted of felony crimes when a New York jury found him guilty of all 34 charges in a scheme to illegally influence the 2016 election through a hush-money payment to an adult film performer. On Friday the judge, Justice Juan Merchan, delayed Trump’s sentencing until 26 November – after the election date of 5 November.
For any other candidate on a debate stage, the convictions would be a huge liability. But Trump has repeatedly rallied his base by falsely claiming that the case, and others relating to election interference and mishandling classified information, are bogus and politically motivated. Should the topic arise on Tuesday, he is likely to cast himself as a martyr and also remind viewers that he was nearly assassinated in July.
The 90-minute duel, held at Philadelphia’s National Constitutional Center, will be moderated by the ABC News anchors David Muir and Linsey Davis. In accordance with rules negotiated by both campaigns, there will be no live audience and candidates’ microphones will be muted when it is not their turn to speak.
The same rules seemed to work in Trump’s favour when he took on Biden in Atlanta in June. Aaron Kall, director of debate at the University of Michigan, said: “Trump adjusted well to no audience and the cutting of the microphones in Atlanta. Biden clearly didn’t.
“He had never debated when there’s no audience; same thing with Harris. Not getting any feedback and not knowing how things are going, you have to trust your judgment and who’s got better media instincts than a reality television host?”
The muting of the microphones may not only save Trump from himself – he interrupted Biden 71 times during their first presidential debate in 2020 – but prevent Harris offering sharp rejoinders such as “I’m speaking”, a line she delivered against Mike Pence in the vice-presidential debate four years ago.
Harris and Trump have never met before in person and, in the city of Rocky Balboa, are likely to take on the roles of boxer and fighter respectively. Trump, 78, is not known for his discipline, preparation or fidelity to the truth. His debate performances, like his governing style, are typically based on gut instinct rather than considered analysis.
Kall, who has attended many presidential debates, added: “You can never count him out because he’s just all over the place in kind of a scattershot format and, when you think you’ve got him on something, he quickly moves to something else. It’s hard to keep up with him so she’s got to pick her spots.
Donald Trump speaks at the Economic Club of New York on Thursday. Photograph: Spencer Platt/Getty Images
“He’s always been known as the more effective counterpuncher. He sometimes doesn’t lob the first volley or attack or argument but then, if she decides to go on the offensive as a prosecutor and treat him in that way, he can be even more deadly in response.”
Trump has struggled to find a coherent and effective line of attack on Harris since she entered the race. He has accused her of being a radical leftist while also suggesting she bears responsibility for Biden’s more centrist policy agenda. He has questioned her intelligence and racial identity. He has also floundered in trying to achieve consistency on the incendiary topic of abortion rights.
Republicans will be hoping that his debate showing is more focused and avoids any blatantly sexist or racist behaviour. The last time he faced a female candidate, Hillary Clinton in 2016, he physically hovered behind her in one debate and referred to her as “the devil” and a “nasty woman”.
Larry Jacobs, director of the Center for the Study of Politics and Governance at the University of Minnesota, said: “The Harris campaign was eager for his mic to be live because they think he’s his worst enemy and that’s true. He has a very limited attention span.
“He’s a remarkably undisciplined candidate, particularly at this level, and he’s profoundly uncomfortable with women and people of colour. I don’t see any change in that orientation. Already in this campaign he’s come out with some pretty offensive comments about Kamala Harris. I’d expect more of that and it’s possible that Kamala Harris is going to push him in ways that might provoke that reaction.”
Harris enters the debate with momentum. After she closed out the convention on 22 August, her campaign announced she had raised more than $500m since entering the race. The polling aggregator website 538 shows Harris up by three percentage points in national polls but much tighter races in some battleground states.
Simon Rosenberg, a Democratic strategist, said: “Kamala Harris is a capable politician operating at the height of her powers. She’s going to come and have a good debate and he is, in all likelihood based on his current run of public performances, going to say things that are ugly and shocking and he’ll do further damage to an already damaged campaign.”
But the vice-president may come under pressure to explain reversals in her positions on issues such as universal healthcare, fracking, plastic straws and decriminalising illegal border crossings. She could face questions over the Biden-Harris administration’s economic record, especially inflation, forcing her both to defend her boss and promise to turn a new page.
Lanhee Chen, a fellow in American public policy studies at the Hoover Institution thinktank in Stanford, California, said: “The substance of what she’s rolled out so far either completely contradicts her past history or they’re just not really good ideas for the most part. If she’s able to actually propose some new ideas in this debate and give people some grist for the mill, that’s a much better approach.”
History suggests, however, that debates are less about policy than memorable moments. Examples include Ronald Reagan’s “There you go again,” tease of Jimmy Carter, George HW Bush’s glance at his watch, Al Gore’s sighs and Trump’s apparent threat to jail Clinton. Political scientists also still question whether the impact on public opinion is fleeting or lasting enough to make a difference on election day.
Chen, who was policy director for the 2012 Mitt Romney presidential campaign, cited the example of Romney’s forceful first debate performance against a lacklustre President Barack Obama in 2012. “We saw a significant bump for Romney in public polling as well as our private polling after that tremendous debate performance against Obama in 2012,” he recalled.
“In that first debate, he picked up a number of points that was well outside the margin of error in many places. It was a couple of weeks of positive momentum and then the race kind of came back to stasis after that.”
Chen added: “The debate doesn’t just happen in a vacuum. You have the debate but you also have world events and you have what the campaigns do after the debate as well. The debate will have impact but the impact is probably short term and will eventually wash out with other campaign events as they happen.”
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Yommie
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Yommie
Elite Member
FAU/Mainstreet Poll: Trump Edges Harris in Georgia and North Carolina
A new poll from the FAU PolCom Lab and Mainstreet Research USA reveals a tight U.S. presidential race in the swing states of Georgia and North Carolina.
FAU/Mainstreet Poll: Trump Edges Harris in Georgia and North Carolina
2024 presidential race is in its final 2 months
By joshua glanzer | 9/9/2024
A new poll from the Florida Atlantic University Political Communication and Public Opinion Research Lab (PolCom Lab) and Mainstreet Research USA reveals a tight U.S. presidential race in the swing states of Georgia and North Carolina.
The recent polls conducted in Georgia and North Carolina reveal a highly competitive landscape for the upcoming election, offering significant insights into voter preferences, media consumption and electoral trust.
Former U.S. President Donald Trump holds a small lead over U.S Vice President Kamala Harris 47% to 45% among likely voters in Georgia. And in North Carolina, Trump narrowly leads Harris 48% to 47%.
In the North Carolina gubernatorial race, Democratic candidate Josh Stein is leading Republican Mark Robinson 50% to 39%, with 7% of likely voters undecided.
“The close distribution of support between the two major party candidates suggests that Georgia and North Carolina remain highly competitive,” said Kevin Wagner, Ph.D., professor of political science and co-director of the PolCom Lab. “Among likely voters, the undecided population, though small, could still play a crucial role in determining the outcome, particularly in a tight race such as this one.”
Trust in Election Process: Majority Confident, but Division Remains
While the race in both states is tight, the way voters feel about the process remains positive, with 61% in Georgia indicating they find the electoral process trustworthy (33% very trustworthy and 28% somewhat trustworthy). In North Carolina, 56% find the process trustworthy (33% very trustworthy and 23% somewhat trustworthy).
Campaign Ad Visibility: Mixed Results in Ad Wars
As Trump and Harris fight for visibility through their respective ad campaigns, each candidate can claim more visibility in one of the states. In Georgia, Harris/Walz ads are slightly more visible (31%) than Trump/Vance ads (23%); while in North Carolina, Trump/Vance ads are slightly more visible (29%) than Harris/Walz ads (26%).
News Source Preferences: Traditional Media Dominates, Digital Gains Ground
Likely voters in both states continue to utilize cable news as their main source of information. Of those polled, 41% in Georgia and 39% in North Carolina seek this traditional format, with 28% in Georgia and 25% relying on national news. More Republicans prefer cable news’ sources (53% in Georgia, 49% in North Carolina); as compared to Democrats (35% in both Georgia and North Carolina); and Independents (28% in Georgia; 32% in North Carolina).
Online news sources are preferred by 19% in Georgia and 18% in North Carolina; however, 30% of voters in Georgia and 25% in North Carolina under the age of 50 indicated they use social media and websites over all other forms of media.
“The divide in how voters get their news reveals just how fractured political media has become,” said Carol Bishop Mills, Ph.D., professor of communication and co-director of the PolCom Lab.
The polls also reveal other implications of findings regarding media landscape, nationalization of the race, as well as ad visibility and voter engagement:
- The dominance of cable news underscores the importance of television advertising and appearances for candidates for older and more conservative voters.
- The significant share of online sources, particularly for younger voters, indicates that campaigns must maintain a strong digital presence.
- Low reliance on local news (8% in Georgia, 12% in North Carolina) suggests voters are focused on broader narratives, impacting campaign strategies.
- The near-even split in ad visibility indicates intense competition, with potential voter fatigue due to high ad saturation.
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