Harris vs. Trump: Debate Analysis and State of The Race
Last night, Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump took to the debate stage for the first and likely only time this election cycle.??
Read below for analysis of the debate, the state of the race, and what the implications of Trump or Harris win would mean for tax, trade, and environmental policy.??
Key Takeaways from the Debate?
Last night’s debate revealed sharp contrasts between the candidates on style and substance. The debate was thin on policy and instead focused largely on differences in? attitude and tone, with back-and-forth on key social issues like abortion and immigration. Harris looked forward, imploring the American people to “turn the page,” while Trump returned to his theme of American carnage, describing “a failing nation” under the Biden/Harris administration.??
Trump tried to tie Harris to Biden, referring to the current President as “her boss” and saying “she is Joe Biden.” Still, Harris kept Trump on the back foot, and he spent most of the debate defending his record – on abortion, January 6, and COVID.??
Trump repeatedly returned to the issue of immigration, falsely claiming that American towns are overrun with “criminals and terrorists” from other countries. At one point repeating a falsehood circulating on right-wing social media that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio are eating pets, and doubling down when fact-checked live by moderator David Muir. The border is perhaps the strongest issue for Republicans and a particular point of weakness for Harris, who Biden appointed “Border Czar” early in his administration.??
Perhaps Harris’s finest moment came during her answer on abortion, when she delivered the sort of impassioned defence of reproductive healthcare that, much to Democrats’ frustration, President Biden never has. She referred to the proliferation of abortion restrictions in the wake of the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade as “Trump abortion bans.” In public opinion polling and state-level referenda, voters consistently prefer Democrats’ more permissive approach to reproductive healthcare.??
Still, neither candidate landed a knockout blow, and the focus on Trump’s record left little room for Vice President Harris to define herself to the American people.???
State of the Race?
While Democrats are thrilled with the state of play – certainly compared to July, when President Biden faced an impossible climb to re-election – it remains a very close race with less than two months to go.??
More tangential indicators suggest that Democrats have a considerable enthusiasm advantage. The DNC’s ratings were 20-40 percent better than corresponding nights of the RNC. The Harris campaign announced recently that it has raised over $500 million in the month since Biden stepped aside, likely expanding its $70 million cash-on-hand advantage. (The Trump campaign has not released corresponding numbers.) And Harris campaign insiders have reported a dramatic surge in volunteer signups in the past month, which should help with get-out-the-vote operations.?
Polling data suggests Harris has erased Biden’s deficit. According to Fivethirtyeight’s polling averages, she is leading Trump by roughly three points in a national head-to-head matchup – probably the minimum popular vote advantage she’d need to win the electoral college. Battleground polling indicates that she is at least competitive in the six states – Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin – that Biden swept in 2020. Some recent surveys suggest that North Carolina – which has a Democratic Governor, but has not voted for a Democratic Presidential candidate since Barack Obama in 2008 – could be in play. Still, Harris is within the margin of error in nearly every battleground state. Despite her momentum, there is a very real chance Trump will win – 64 percent according to Nate Silver .?
It will take a few days for the results of yesterday’s debate to reflect in public opinion polling. As we saw during Biden’s debacle in June, debates can define candidate narratives, sometimes indelibly, though they often serve more to reinforce existing perceptions than to radically reshape them. One recent survey suggested that undecided voters need to know more about Harris; we’ll know soon whether this debate helped those voters make up their minds.??
What This Means For Policy?
A Harris administration would look meaningfully different than a second Trump administration on three key dimensions: tax, trade, and the environment.??
Tax?
In 2017, Trump signed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) into law. Most individual tax cuts included in the TCJA are set to expire in 2025 due to a Senate rule requiring at least 60 votes in the Senate for long-term spending decisions. (The corporate tax cut in the TCJA, from 28 percent to 21 percent, is permanent.)?
Given the expiration of key TCJA provisions, it’s almost certain that Congress will have to deal with the tax code next year. Trump and Harris have unveiled starkly different proposals for doing so.?
Harris has proposed to:??
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Trump has proposed to:??
In the event of a divided government – a very realistic possibility regardless of who wins the White House – the opposing party will retain an effective veto power over any of these proposals.??
Trade?
Washington’s favouring of free trade in its international dealmaking is long-gone. Trump’s victory in 2016 sealed a new protectionist streak in American politics, with Biden following suit. Trump exited TPP negotiations and NAFTA, and Biden’s legislative agenda has been laser-focused on the protection and expansion of domestic manufacturing jobs – many of which are based in key swing states.??
Both Harris and Trump are centering economic protectionism as they work to appeal to undecided voters in swing states, an electorate that remains cautious about the risk of offshoring. The contrast between the two can best be defined as carrot vs. stick: Harris is more likely to continue the Biden Administration policy of seeking investments in domestic manufacturing of things like semiconductors and renewable energy, while Trump is likely to enact further, more sweeping tariffs.?
Strategic manufacturing sectors, including automotive, clean energy, and semiconductors have been ring-fenced under a Biden administration seeking tougher measures against China. Trump has gone even further and proposed a blanket 10 percent global tariff and a 60 percent tariff on all Chinese imports – something Harris in the debate called the “Trump sales tax.” Swing states like Michigan, which has seen a boom in EV production, and Arizona, which has seen a combined $60 billion in investment from computing companies TSMC and Intel, rely on preserving their edge in an intensely competitive global market. They also hold the keys to the White House.?
Don’t expect the United States to favour free trade again any time soon, no matter who wins in November.??
Environmental
Environmental policy is perhaps one of the starkest differences between prospective Harris and Trump administrations. Harris will likely ensure the full implementation of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which has accounted for record investment in clean energy production. Don’t expect this to be central to her campaigning, however, as she looks avoid casting light on her 2020 calls to ban fracking – a critical industry in Pennsylvania, whose 19 electoral votes hang in the balance.?
Trump, by contrast, has campaigned to “drill, baby, drill.” He’ll seek to loosen restrictions to access US strategic oil reserves, which he sees as a necessary gateway to economic growth and alleviation of inflationary pressures. He could withdraw from the Paris Agreement, as he did during his previous term. He may also again seek budget cuts to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), having proposed a 26 per cent reduction in its funding during his time as President, and would likely repeal Biden-era EPA rules curtailing emissions from automobiles and fossil fuel-burning power plants. While Trump has stated his intention to unravel the IRA, that would largely require an act of Congress, which is unlikely; still, he could use executive action to stymie the implementation of certain measures.??
What’s Next??
Voting. While Election Day is on 5 November, early voting starts much sooner in many states – in the crucial swing state of Pennsylvania, early voting starts on 16 September. In 2020, 99 million Americans cast early votes.??
Debates. Tim Walz will take on JD Vance on 1 October in the only Vice Presidential debate. There are no further Presidential debates remaining.?
Unfortunately, the former President went into the land of la la land too often for my liking