Did Trump really lose the debate?

By Peter Wolfgang ( bio - articles - email ) | Sep 13, 2024

The only debate between President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris is now in the rear-view mirror and the verdict is in. Kamala beat Trump.

The pundits say so. Your disappointed Trump-loving friends say so. Are they right?

I don’t think so.

I saw a very different debate than what everyone else saw. If the public saw it too, then I’m right. If the public saw what the pundits and disappointed Trumpers saw, then I’m wrong.

We will know soon, once there is more scientific data to pour over, as to what effect, if any, the debate had on the coming election. In the meantime, here is what I saw.

First, I should preface my comments by saying that the difference between my debate reaction and everyone else’s may have to do with a difference in expectations. Many Trumpers were on a high coming off Trump’s knockout punch against Biden. They thought he would similarly crush Kamala.

That was never my expectation. Granted, Kamala outperformed everyone’s expectations, including mine. But Trump did exactly what I expected him to do.

The truth is, Trump has never been a great debater. What he has been, even before Kamala became this too, is a “vibes” candidate. And it has worked for him.

In 2016 Trump slew a plethora of establishment Republicans in debate, by articulating issues that had never been addressed on the presidential level (outside of Pat Buchanan’s two campaigns in the 1990s). NATO should pay its fair share, the U.S. should not be the world’s policeman, free trade is eroding our manufacturing base, cultural decay is destroying the American working class, etc.

Trump did not promulgate detailed policy proposals for how he would address these matters. He did not have to. This may partly explain Trump’s allergic reaction to the Heritage Foundation’s “Project 2025,” which seeks to provide such a blueprint in the current race. Why get bogged down in details that can be picked apart when you don’t have to?

What Trump did instead is meet the moment. He gave off the “vibes” that voters—or at least, an electoral college majority of voters—were feeling in 2016. The elites were feathering their nests at the expense of their countrymen and Trump, a traitor to his own class, was taking the country’s side. It was “the rise of the unprotected,” as the Wall Street Journal’s Peggy Noonan called it in her Pulitzer Award-winning columns on that election.

“Crooked” Hillary Clinton, of course, fit right into that narrative. Bill and Hillary were the Bonnie and Clyde of American politics, always one step ahead of the fuzz. You knew they were dirty but you couldn’t prove it. The closest you could get to some accountability was watching Trump crush her in the election.

That, I think, was the vibe that Trump was riding through the debates in 2016. The vibe thing failed him in 2020, when he failed to speak convincingly to the country’s anxiety over Covid-era government overreach and the George Floyd riots. But in 2024, it is back in his favor.

Even Trump’s knockout punch against Biden this past June was not because Trump did so well in the debate. It was because Biden did so badly. All Trump had to do was hold back and let Biden expose his own mental decline. Trump’s one memorable line—when he said he didn’t understand what Biden had just said and that he didn’t think even Biden understood it—captured the vibe we were all feeling.

Now comes the debate against Kamala. Yes, she was less emotional than Trump. And she was seemingly more specific about policy.

But not really. Kamala spoke in abstractions that did not amount to much of anything. We need “an opportunity economy,” we need “to go forward, not backward,” blah, blah, blah.

Yes, the strange cackling laugh was gone. Yes, there were no word salads. Yes, she baited Trump and he frequently took the bait. Kamala did what she needed to do.

But so did Trump.

Trump paints in broad strokes. And contrary to what everyone is saying, his punches did land.

The last four years under Biden-Harris have been a disaster. Without going deep into the weeds, Trump spoke to that feeling, that vibe. Immigration, inflation, Afghanistan, global conflicts, etc.

If you are someone who has been affected by inflation and crime, Trump spoke to you. If, instead, you’ve been conditioned to believe that Trump questioning Kamala’s race is a bigger deal than your grocery bill, he did not speak to you.

I think most of the country is the former, not the latter. And there is already some evidence that I am correct.

The New York Times—normally the very organ that thinks up opinions for the elites so that the elites don’t have to think for themselves—noticed the split between how pundits reacted to the debate and how undecided voters are reacting. Kimberley Strassel in the Wall Street Journal today does a deep dive on the same subject.

Add to this a bias on the part of the ABC “moderators” that was so blatant that it even earned a rebuke from a longtime pollster for the Clintons.

Add, further, Kamala’s obnoxious facial expressions. That is not a good vibe. People will react against that.

No, Kamala did not best Trump in that debate. Trump rebutted her points and frequently turned them back on her. That, plus the three-on-one dynamic, plus those facial expressions, plus the fact that Trump is addressing real anxieties while Kamala spoke in platitudes, adds up to a Trump win.

Not a knockout, like he scored against Biden. But a win. Or, at worst, a draw. Which, given the numbers right now, is still a Trump win.

Peter Wolfgang is president of Family Institute of Connecticut Action, a Hartford-based advocacy organization whose mission is to encourage and strengthen the family as the foundation of society. His work has appeared in The Hartford Courant, the Waterbury Republican-American, Crisis Magazine, Columbia Magazine, the National Catholic Register, CatholicVote, Catholic World Report, the Stream and Ethika Politika. He lives in Waterbury, Conn., with his wife and their seven children. The views expressed on Catholic Culture are solely his own. See full bio.

Show 7 Comments? (Hidden)Hide Comments

• Posted by: Headmaster - Sep. 22, 2024 11:46 AM ET USA

  I wanted to confine my comment to a simple grammatical one, namely that “to pour over” ought to be “to pore over”, in which case I would not have commented at all. We all make grammatical mistakes. However, it is a greater mistake to publish a wholly political opinion piece in Catholic Culture, devoid of any nexus with anything Catholic. As much as I might agree with the author on many of the points made, the article belongs elsewhere.

• Posted by: grateful1 - Sep. 16, 2024 6:18 PM ET USA

  I don't think this political piece--untethered to matters of Catholic doctrine, liturgy, or culture--is suitable for CatholicCulture.org. I say that as a faithful Catholic who will be voting for Trump for the 3rd time (even though I disagree with him on a number of issues, none of which were even hinted at in this piece). When I want purely political pieces, I turn elsewhere. Get back to what we can only get from you, CC.

• Posted by: feedback - Sep. 14, 2024 11:52 PM ET USA

  Excellent summary: "If you’ve been conditioned to believe that Trump questioning Kamala’s race is a bigger deal than your grocery bill, he did not speak to you"! The live so-called "fact-checking" of Trump was especially annoying and obviously biased, while Kamala was free to spout debunked election hoaxes, the "fine people" hoax etc. Trump had a great, though v. brief, moment when he said he didn't care at all if Kamala wanted to identify herself as a Black person. He handled that bait v. well.

• Posted by: euan61003909 - Sep. 14, 2024 7:58 AM ET USA

  Like this commentary from Peter - definitely a new angle and accurate as to what plays out to people. Thanks. Mrs Maria Reid Glasgow

• Posted by: PTabbita5370 - Sep. 13, 2024 11:17 PM ET USA

  I expected some specific moral or Catholic faith-based insight on the debate instead it was more of a political analysis of how various voters might see the debate. Interesting, but is it Catholic Culture? If CatholicCulture.org commentators venture into partisan politics, I would expect there would be an important faith-based reason with some insight on what Catholics should think about or how Catholics might evaluate issues.

• Posted by: philtech2465 - Sep. 13, 2024 6:03 PM ET USA

  This is not an appropriate article for Catholic Culture, being nothing more than political commentary without any tie to Catholic faith or Catholic moral teaching. I appreciate the difficulty in staying out of politics in this highly polarized year, considering the pro-life issue. But this went over the line.

• Posted by: Randal Mandock - Sep. 13, 2024 3:20 PM ET USA

  I stopped watching debate theater in 2016. For the most part, this style of debate intends to conjure emotional hype. The substance of any candidate for electoral office is in his or her actual past performance. When allowed to, Trump had good performane statistics. Unfortunately, his own cabinet and Congress duped him many times over. Harris, on the other hand, was usually more clueless than Biden, and that's saying a mouthful. "Who, me border czar?" "Who, me vice president?" "Been to Paris?"