Front Burner - Stumbles, mumbles, smears: a U.S. presidential debate recap

Episode Date: June 28, 2024

It was déjà vu all over again in Atlanta, Ga., on Thursday night as Donald Trump and Joe Biden squared off in the first presidential debate of the 2024 campaign. Biden will be looking to secure a second term in November, while Trump will be looking to take the office back for a second term of his own. And indeed, much of the debate focused on rehashing both men's records in office — to varying degrees of veracity and coherence.The CBC's Washington correspondent Katie Simpson breaks down both candidates' performances, the debate's biggest moments, and what it could all mean for the campaign ahead.For transcripts of this series, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

In the Dragon's Den, a simple pitch can lead to a life-changing connection. Watch new episodes of Dragon's Den free on CBC Gem. Brought to you in part by National Angel Capital Organization, empowering Canada's entrepreneurs through angel investment and industry connections. This is a CBC Podcast. Hi, I'm Allie Janes, in for Jamie Poisson. About half of Americans wish that neither Joe Biden or Donald Trump were on the ticket this November. They'd replace both of them, according to polling from the Pew Research Center.

But here we are. And last night, Joe Biden and Donald Trump spent 90 minutes trying to convince Americans to suck it up and choose one of them. My colleague Katie Simpson is in Atlanta with a whole bunch of other journalists at CNN headquarters, right across the street from where the debate took place. And she's here with me to break down all the key moments of the first presidential debate. Katie, first of all, thank you so much for being here. It is pretty much midnight Eastern time on Thursday night, and the debate is just finished. So thank you so much for taking time to do this. I'm sure you're very tired. You know what? I've had like three Diet Cokes, so we've all got the caffeine shakes, so we are ready to go. Good. Okay, let's do this. Let's do this. Okay, listen, I think we have to

start by talking about these guys' performances because like ultimately that's what a lot of people are going to walk away from this with, right? Like rather than the specific policy notes. So let's start with Biden. His physical and mental fitness has been a major topic of discussion for quite a while. And this is, you know, the longest relatively unfiltered appearance we've seen from him in quite some time. And I mean, his team insists that the Biden that they see in private is vibrant, is in control. Is that who Americans saw tonight? This is a very challenging moment for Democrats, and it's certainly not what they were hoping for, because the number one thing everyone is talking about right now is that Biden looked old. When the camera was on him and it wasn't his time to talk, he tried to put this outraged look on his face, but he just looked

lost and confused. He lost his train of thought time after time after time. And he really stumbled and bumbled in a way that Americans haven't necessarily seen. What I'm going to do is fix the tax system. For example, we have a thousand trillionaires in America, I mean billionaires in America. You know, his staff around him really try to protect him. They don't put him out there that much. And, you know, his team wanted to hold a debate. They thought that this was going to be a good idea.

And tonight, if you're an American voter and you're watching this debate and, you know, you're thinking about voting for Joe Biden, but you're concerned maybe he is a little too old, maybe, you know, he's past his time. If you tuned into that debate, all of your sort of instincts and your thoughts there, they were just reconfirmed. He didn't do anything to break through the narrative that he's too old to run. There's a particularly rough moment that I want to hone in on. Biden was talking about the national debt. I think this was about like 12 minutes into the debate. He was talking about the national debt and he started talking about Medicare, you know, just going to like beat Medicare or we beat Medicare or something. And he kind of just

glitched out. Making sure that we're able to make every single solitary person eligible for what I've been able to do with the COVID, excuse me, with dealing with everything we have to do with, look, if we finally beat Medicare. And Trump jumped on this moment. He was right. He did beat Medicare. Thank you, President. And Trump jumped on this moment. He was right. He did beat Medicare. He beat it to death. And he's destroying Medicare because... And I mean, what kind of impact do you think that moment had in the eyes of voters?

Well, you know, when it comes to TV, right, it's not necessarily the substance of what you say, but how you say it. And if you use that sort of measure um joe biden was there making a point about one thing and then trailed off lost his train of thought and donald trump just jumped and seized on that moment it went exactly how the trump campaign was hoping it was going to go you know they i i truly don't think it could have in terms of Biden's performance. That's exactly what Trump's team has been saying. They run campaign ads down here that

are quite personal and quite nasty. There's one where it's like Joe Biden's the guy that lost the fight with the stairs and they show the clip of him falling up the stairs and how he lost a fight putting on his jacket and he's having trouble putting on his jacket, those kinds of things. The Trump campaign is going to seize on this. And so when you have standout moments like that, that really become the headline clips that get played on social media, moment after moment after moment, it really becomes difficult for Joe Biden. Again, if he wanted to come out here and show people, you know, he's energetic,

he's with it, he's still got it. Democrats are not feeling very good in this moment. I saw our colleague Paul Hunter speaking tonight on CBC saying that, you know, that one moment should be a wake up call for Democrats that like that they might need to switch horses here before like they might need another candidate. Do you think the party sees it that way? Well, here's the thing. Changing that at this point in the election campaign is really complicated and really difficult. I think Democrats who are really super close to Joe Biden need to start to ask themselves some questions about how how did it get to this point where Joe Biden was put on this stage and had such a really difficult performance and difficult as being really, I think, generous in the way describing what happened tonight? You know, is there time to switch things out and and could they have a major change at the convention in August in Chicago? in August in Chicago. There are going to be some hard questions for Democrats, particularly those closest to Joe Biden, who maybe didn't say, listen, you know, you're 81 years old. Perhaps this isn't your time anymore. Were there any moments where you think, you know, he did come

alive, where he showed flashes of this Biden that his closest aides say that they see all the time? Well, so there were some moments where he went after Trump's character, talking about his criminal convictions, saying things like, you know, you've got the morals of an alley cat. That's one moment that's sort of going to stand out there. Very Joe Biden. Very Joe Biden. He said malarkey. But the thing is, the substance of some of the points he was making about his opponent,

Donald Trump, some of it's very, very true. You know, Democrats argue that, that you know in this election democracy is on the line that's that's the point they're trying to make they say donald trump is not going to protect the institutions that help you know the united states be the strongest democracy in the world i've never heard so much foolishness this is a guy who wants to get out of nato you're going to stay in nato he's going to pull out of nato the idea that we have our strength lies in our alliances as well. And, you know, Democrats, if this is the fight they're in, they sent Joe Biden to be the warrior for this fight.

He did have a couple of moments where he, you know, went after Trump on some of the more personal things, talking about how he had sex with a porn star and his criminal charges, you know, pointing out the fact that he's a convicted felon. The only person in this stage is a convicted felon is the man I'm looking at right now. What he's telling you is simply not true. The fact is that there was no effort on his part to stop what was going on up in Capitol Hill. But, you know, those kinds of things just roll off Trump. Trump kind of is in this position where he holds up a mirror. No matter what you say to

him, he just holds up a mirror and reflects it back to the person who's criticizing him. But he could be a convicted felon as soon as he gets out of office. Joe could be a convicted felon with all of the things that he's done. He's done horrible things. All of the death caused at the border. So whether any of that was sort of effective in sort of, you know, taking on Trump, you know, that'll we'll have to wait and see about that. But really, the big takeaways tonight are really going to be connected to Joe Biden's performance. I mean, I got to say that they're like, very honestly, I often had to turn up the volume on the TV when when he was talking.

And it did occur to me, I mean, when you're talking about these really, you know, the moments where he was strong, where he was making strong arguments. I just kept thinking, like, if this was the Joe Biden even four years ago, like his his delivery would have made those really strong lines. But it was often hard to hear, like literally hard to hear what he was saying. His voice was hoarse. And Joe Biden does have a stutter. It's something that he talks about. And it's something that he deals with, you know, when he does public speaking. And I think a lot of Americans are very happy to give him grace on that,

understanding that that is an issue that's out of his control. But, you know, he sounded hoarse. He sounded like he, you know, he had a cold. He'd just been out of the public eye for a week. He was practicing at Camp David, running mock debates with his advisors. For someone who is resting and, you know, sort of preparing the traditional way for this debate, he didn't look, he didn't respond in a way where he like appeared rested. You know, he sounded hoarse. He appeared to have low energy. And, you know, he had a he struggled at moments to stay on topic and, you know, make the points he was trying to make. Maybe one of the most jaw dropping moments of this debate, I mean, certainly for me, was this like totally bizarre exchange about golf.

Trump was bragging about his golf scores as he is wont to do. We knock on wood wherever we may have wood that I'm in very good health. I just won two club championships, not even senior, two regular club championships. To do that, you have to be quite smart and you have to be able to hit the ball a long way. And I do it. He doesn't do it. He can't hit a ball 50 yards. He challenged me. But then the shocking part was Biden took the bait. I told you before, I'm happy to play golf if you carry your own bag. Think you can do it?

That's the biggest lie that I've ever heard. He's a six handicap of all. I was an eight handicap. Yeah. Eight? Never. But I have, you know how many you got? I've seen you swing. I know you swing.

Let's not act like children. President Trump, we're going to carry you swing Let's not act like children President Trump, we're going to go Let's not act like children Talk to me about that moment and what you were thinking You know, what really stands out to me If you needed a reminder that this was a contest Between two old white men There you go, that's your reminder

Number one Number two, I think, you know Right now in the United States There is a cost of living crisis. It's very similar to what's going on in Canada. People can't afford groceries. Housing prices have gone up. Rent is going up.

There is an immigration crisis when it comes to what's going on at the southern U.S. border and finding ways to sort of deal with the overwhelming number of people who are coming to the United States, trying to start a new life, get a better opportunity for their children and how we deal with that. And, you know, the debate moderators didn't step in as these two candidates are going off about golf and how they want to play golf together. And it just it seemed so out of sort of like the the what the realities are for people who might be watching this, hoping to learn something new or hoping to make up their minds.

It was a bizarre moment. In the Dragon's Den, a simple pitch can lead to a life-changing connection. Watch new episodes of Dragon's Den free on CBC Gem. Brought to you in part by National Angel Capital Organization, empowering Canada's entrepreneurs through angel investment and industry connections. Hi, it's Ramit Sethi here. You may have seen my money show on Netflix.

I've been talking about money for 20 years. I've talked to millions of people and I have some startling numbers to share with you. Did you know that of the people I speak to, 50% of them do not know their own household income? That's not a typo. 50%. That's because money is confusing. In my new book and podcast, Money for Couples, I mean, maybe this is, you know, inside baseball journalist thing, but I was, I was like, found it very frustrating that throughout they just, the format was like,

it didn't allow for them to fact check the candidates. And they also didn't jump in, in general, if the candidates didn't answer the questions. And talk to me a bit about how Trump kind of used that because, you know, on the charitable end of things, he is, let's say, prone to hyperbole. Very often he's prone to outright lies, misinformation. And so talk to me about where he kind of took that in this debate, particularly because they weren't jumping in to moderate that. they weren't jumping in to moderate that. Donald Trump just steamrolled ahead with some lies,

some misinformation and some exaggeration. The moderators in this debate format, they asked questions, but they didn't push back. Sometimes they would ask a follow up question, you know, if a candidate didn't directly answer the question. But that was rare. So you had this format where these two very senior, very respected journalists at CNN, who often use their airtime to talk about how you have to call a lie a lie, how you have to push back against misinformation. And a choice was made that these moderators were going to ask questions.

They didn't push back and fact check. But one thing to remember is, it was Joe Biden and the Democrats. They proposed going away, going around the debate commission. They wanted to do it this way. They set the rules and agreed to the rules and the Trump team agreed to the rules. So for whatever complaints

are going to be coming from Democrats about the moderators or about how this went down, they agreed to this and they're the ones that wanted this to happen at this point in the campaign. In terms of Trump, what were some of the pieces of misinformation that he gave that really stuck out to you? There were a couple that were quite egregious, I guess. Let me start with an outright lie. One thing that we know is a lie.

So he was asked about whether he would accept the results of the 2024 election. And he said, you know, if it's free and fair and a good election, and then he made a reference to election fraud in 2020. There was no widespread election fraud in 2020. It's something that he says at his rallies quite frequently. And when he talks about his grievances, that is one of his top grievances that he just frequently repeats. It is not true. And the fact that this happened in the state of Georgia is sort of a reminder of that. Remember, he's facing 10 criminal charges in Georgia. Originally it was 13. It's now down to 10. Where his supporters believed when he said that, you know, there was widespread fraud.

And, you know, the Republican officials who ran the election, this is a state where Republicans, you know, hold the most power at the statehouse. The Republicans who ran the election had to really push back against that. Those lies about election fraud have lasting impact, especially here in this state. Donald Trump said some things that are not true when it came to abortion and the ongoing lack of access to that kind of medical care in the United States. The problem they have is they're radical because they will take the life of a child in the eighth month, the ninth month, and even after birth, after birth. And he made exaggerations about his record on the economy.

And also there were lies in there about that as well. So the headline if the headline about Joe Biden is his underwhelming performance, and that might be a generous description. The headline is that Donald Trump just said pretty much whatever he wanted to and was completely unchecked. Joe Biden tried to stop him by saying that's a lot of malarkey and everything he says is lies. And and, you know, Joe Biden isn't wrong there. But because his delivery was so underwhelming, it didn't really stop what was going on. So let's talk about, you know, some of the policy issues that came up in the debate. And they certainly follow that kind of pattern that you've just been talking about.

Let's talk about abortion. So, you know, just quick recap. A Supreme Court stalked with Trump picks overturned Roe v. Wade. The Democrats have been really keen to run on reproductive rights. We know this is a really motivating issue for a lot of Democratic voters. Did Biden get anywhere in terms of advancing that agenda in this debate? Well, Joe Biden really stuck to what his party's position is on this, and that they want to restore the rights that were taken away. And sort of what's called codifying, they want to codify Roe v.

Wade. So they want to put into law the protections that were there that the Supreme Court had overturned. And so, you know, Biden wants to talk about that as much as humanly possible because elections in the past have shown that American voters support reproductive rights and they're frustrated with what's happened with the court. And Democrats are promising that they're going to do what they can, whether it's legislation or whether it's some sort of other kind of action, that they're going to try and get to a place where they can restore those rights. And they want to blame Donald Trump for what's happened, pointing the fact that, you know, he appointed those justices that overturned the decision. It was his three justices that did it. And so Donald Trump was sort of pressed on that, about whether he would put into place a national abortion ban

or whether he would ban the medication abortion, the abortion pill. He said, no, he wouldn't do that. And, you know, he said, listen, this is where it should be. It's up to the states that want to make decisions about it. What happened is we brought it back to the states and the country is now coming together on this issue. It's been a great thing. Thank you. President Biden? It's been a terrible thing, what you've done. The fact is that the vast majority of now,

Joe Biden tried to counter that by saying, yeah, that's like putting civil rights with the you know, the states, some states want to roll back civil rights. And so he's trying to make that point and highlight that, you know, what else could Donald Trump chip away at if he is given more power and returns to the White House. Did Joe Biden make any new gains on that? Probably not. Decisions around abortion or attitudes around abortion are pretty much baked in at this point. And voters know that, you know, if they support access and they support those kinds of rights, that the Democrats are the party to try and, you know, advance that and get back to that place. And if not, you know, Republicans are trying to sort of not be associated with removing those rights because it's a political winner, but they're just trying to sort of tread a careful line there.

Trump seemed to really hijack this portion of the debate and make it revolve around late-term abortions. and make it revolve around late-term abortions. He had some pretty wild misinformation that he has stated before about Democrats allowing babies to be killed after they're born, which is absolutely not true. But, you know, can you talk to me a bit about that? Like, to what extent do you think that he was able to hijack that point of the debate, which should have been, you know, a real win for Biden? Yeah, he's really going on

and on about late term abortion, something that is incredibly rare in the United States. And there are so many debates about, you know, what kind of medical care a patient can get, you know, if there is a complication or if the mother's life is in danger or, you know, it's so wild that in 2024 that this is sort of where the debate is in the united states when for so many years it sort of had been put to the back burner and it wasn't considered this this issue like the rights were there they were protected um the the kind of hyperbole and and lies that donald trump used in his uh claims around this point you know that's a nod to the evangelical really socially conservative base of support that you know helped him get here in the first place, that helped him win the

White House the first time. And so, you know, a key part of Donald Trump's base that may have some challenges with Trump on other issues, what really gets them motivated is they are motivated by the anti-abortion movement. So let's talk about immigration and the border now. This has been a big issue in this campaign. Both candidates know that. They're making the case that this is something that they can tackle. And talk to me about how that played out in the debate,

because this is definitely something that Trump, you know, really, really ran with, even in questions that had nothing to do with it. Right. So in terms of, you know, the debate that happened tonight, a lot of what we heard from Donald Trump is hyperbole, talking about how he makes this claim that mental institutions and jails are, you know, opening up their doors and everyone's coming up to the United States. We are living right now in a rat's nest. And because of his ridiculous, insane and very stupid policies, people are coming in and they're killing our citizens at a level that we've never seen. We call it migrant crime. I call it Biden migrant crime. They're killing. Are there challenges with the immigration system? Absolutely. But when you, you know, paint things in stark terms with claims that are not true, it's something that really rallies his base and, you know, motivates voters. One thing I will say that's really changed about the debate around immigration is once governors in southern states like Texas and Florida, once they started sending migrants who are waiting for their asylum claims to sort of be adjudicated,

started sending them to cities in the north that have sanctuary city policies like New York, like Chicago, like Denver, what those cities experienced in terms of the strain on the social resources, on shelters, on food banks, those kinds of challenges, it did motivate change

on attitudes towards immigration. Whether any sort of headway was made on it tonight, you know, I don't think so. Like it's, it's, it's, it really didn't move. I didn't see anything that came out to say, hey, that's a new thing that that could lead to something different. It was both of the candidates really leaning into what their positions are. I think we have to talk about the fact that Trump is now a convicted felon for campaign finance violations. This is the hush money stuff. He's also got cases looming about his role in the January 6th insurrection. How did all of that factor into this debate? Well, you know, I thought it would come up more often to be to be frank. I thought that perhaps, you know, the debate moderators might try to push Trump because, you know, it came up a couple of times.

But in the U.S. at this point, attitudes toward Trump and his allegations, a lot of it's sort of baked in the cake already, really. You know, Trump's base, they believe him when he says he's being unfairly targeted. They think that this is Joe Biden sort of weaponizing the justice system against him, even though there is no evidence to back up that claim. He continues to make it. And so the question is, you know, the handful of voters who haven't figured out, you know, who they're going to vote for or what they're feeling just yet. It'll be interesting to see as more of these cases actually head to court. But we're not expected more cases before the election. Right now, you know, a lot of people in America have made up their minds about Trump. Like, you know, there's

not a lot of, he's polarizing. So people have very strong feelings about him. And it's, the question is, you know, he's been convicted and do they care? And a lot of Americans don't care. Okay. So this is only the first debate of the campaign. It's still another four months to the election. There will be more debates. So, Katie, coming out of this debate, if I'm on Team Trump, what's my next move? Like, where do you think he'll go from here? I think the Trump team is going to keep doing exactly what it's doing. And they've already been criticizing Joe Biden, claiming that, you know, they say he's got dementia.

They say he's mentally unfit. They say that he is not the guy. He doesn't have the energy to lead this country for another four years. And Joe Biden's performance in this debate, it didn't really challenge that narrative. So I think you're going to see some really personal, really mean memes. Mean memes, I guess, is the new thing we're going to say. It's but like it's already in that sort of in that sphere. And that's sort of like it motivates laughing at the other guy kind of motivates part of his base. And so expect more of that. He's going to hold a rally on Friday. Expect, you know, more criticisms of Joe Biden, particularly around his age and and his mental

fitness. So that, I think, is the sort of path they're going to be heading on. They're headed toward the Republican convention in July, and Trump's on track to pick a vice president. But I think they're going to bask in this moment, even though that Donald Trump said a lot of things that are not true during this debate. The bigger headline, it's not the lies, it's the performance of Joe Biden. I think they're going to bask in that. OK, so let's go there. What what about Biden? How does his team try to come back from the hits that they've taken here tonight? That is going to be the big question and a lot of questions about how did it get to this point? You know, if the Democratic Party has decided, OK, this is such a high stakes election and then they're putting up a candidate that, you know, is not delivering a performance that they hoped he would deliver. That's a lot of really deep questions need to be asked of the Democrats. And what do they do? Do they try some emergency intervention to try to change things at the convention. Again, it's a nightmare sort of scenario for the Democrats

to try to sort out, you know, what it is that they're going to do. Do they just keep him on the ticket? Kamala Harris, the vice president, was on CNN just after the debate, and even she couldn't really spin, you know, Joe Biden's debate performance tonight, you know, sort of acknowledging that it was a rough, slow start. She keeps trying to point to substance, the substance of what he said. But many Americans, again, TV is the medium. They're watching this, whether it's TV or they're watching it on their phones

and watching this video. So much of what you say can be undercut by the way you say it. And Joe Biden's performance was underwhelming. All right, Katie, we will leave it there. Thank you so much. We really, really appreciate it. And I hope you get some sleep tonight. Thanks, you too. overwhelming all right katie we will leave it there thank you so much uh we we really really appreciate it and i hope you uh get some sleep tonight thanks you too have a good one all right that is all for today front burner was produced this week by Joyta Sengupta, Matt Amha, Matt Mews, Derek Vanderwyk, and Julia Israel.

Sound design was by Matt Cameron and Sam McNulty. Music is by Joseph Chabison. Our senior producer is Aline Chow. Our executive producer is Nate McCabe-Locos. I'm Allie Janes. Thank you for listening to Frontburner.