5 Things That Matter for the Harris/Trump Debate

Cheddar News

Zach Montellaro, Deputy National Editor at Politico, joins Cheddar to discuss what you need to know ahead of the debate between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump.

Transcript

00:00Hi, everybody. I'm Dave Briggs here at the New York Stock Exchange. The first debate of the 2024

00:04presidential cycle was arguably the most consequential in modern American politics,

00:10effectively ending President Biden's presidency and upending the race. Now, Kamala Harris hopes

00:17to define her campaign, which to this point has relied on slogans and speeches. Political

00:23Deputy National Editor Zach Montalero with us now. Five things that matter. Zach, good to see you.

00:29Where does the race stand today? How consequential is this debate?

00:35Yeah, so the race today is incredibly close. You know, when President Biden was still in the race,

00:41you could pretty comfortably say Trump had a narrow but comfortable lead. Now,

00:45it's basically a coin flip between the vice president and former President Trump.

00:49Over this weekend, we saw a poll from The New York Times and Siena College that had the former

00:53president up two points over the vice president. National polling averages generally have the vice

00:58president up anywhere from one, two, three points. So this race is about as close as you can

01:03get. As for how consequential this debate will be, well, debates don't matter until they do,

01:08just ask Joe Biden, as you alluded to it. This could all be nothing. We could come out of this

01:12on Wednesday morning and the race is exactly as it is right now. And that's, I suspect,

01:16where it will be very close. But who knows? Someone could blow up again. We've already

01:20seen it once this cycle. Who's to say it can't happen a second time? Yeah, and they are in

01:25Philly and Pennsylvania largely holds the entire race right there. So Vice President Harris has

01:31given just one interview with her VP pick and largely focused on personal narratives.

01:37What is her strategy? Yeah, so for the vice president, she still has the opportunity to

01:42introduce herself to Americans. That same New York Times poll about about 20 to 25 percent of

01:47Americans said they still don't know enough about Vice President Harris to have an opinion on her,

01:51to make up their mind. They want to learn more. So for the vice president, this is really her

01:55first and biggest opportunity to introduce herself to the American public. I, of course,

02:01as a member of the media, want to see all politicians do more interviews with the media.

02:05But a debate is just going to get so many more eyeballs than an interview with you or I or CNN

02:10or anybody. So this for the vice president is reintroduce herself to the country, the country

02:15that's kind of maybe slipped away from her since 2020. She's the vice president. She's an incredibly

02:20political figure, but she's not at the forefront or at least wasn't at the forefront of everyday

02:24political life. Reintroduce herself and kind of prosecute the case against Trump. And I use the

02:28word prosecute intentionally. She was a former prosecutor, you know, in her convention speech

02:34and the ads we've seen. She's tried to hit Trump over his charges, over what over his role in

02:39overturning Roe v. Wade to her goal. Introduce herself and also, you know, take it to Trump,

02:46take it to Trump directly in the way that Democrats could see her doing in a way that

02:49Biden could not. Expectations are well north of 50 million will watch in some form tomorrow night.

02:56So given his recent social media posts about prosecuting political opponents, what is the

03:03Trump strategy? Yeah, and when I said prosecute for the vice president, I meant that metaphorically,

03:08the former president means that literally, you know, to the degree that Trump has a strategy.

03:14We've now seen what, you know, almost a decade worth of debates from Donald Trump at this point.

03:23He doesn't have a strategy. His strategy is to be Donald Trump. Donald Trump has followed his

03:26gut political instincts time and time and time again, and it more or less has worked out for him.

03:31At least it worked out for him in 2016, didn't work out for him in 2020. But Donald Trump does

03:36not have a strategy. Donald Trump does what Donald Trump wants to do. You know, his social media

03:41posts have certainly been more on the outlandish side recently. It's kind of a return to form for

03:45the former president. And his goal, I guess, is to unnerve the former or the current vice president.

03:51Rather, you know, I believe the vice president and Donald Trump have never actually been in the same

03:56room together before. So he's probably going to want to try to get her off her game, get her off

04:02her notes and attack her as well. But Donald Trump does whatever Donald Trump wants to do. His camp

04:06has said he's not even doing debate prep for him.

04:09That is extraordinary. And they certainly want him to stick with policy.

04:13Don't hold your breath for that happening. What can you tell us

04:17about Kamala Harris's past debate performance in particular in 2020?

04:22Yeah, you know, her 2020 debate performance was uneven. And in the primary, especially,

04:27it's a different audience, literally, in the sense that the Democratic primary electorate,

04:31not all Americans, but she had incredible highs. That girl was me moment when she actually was

04:36ironically attacking President Joe Biden. It was probably the peak of her campaign

04:41that when she, you know, if it looked like she was going to capture the nomination,

04:44it started in that moment. But she had an uneven performance throughout. You know,

04:48some of my colleagues here at Politico wrote about a fight on stage she had with Tulsi Gabbard,

04:52which kind of dragged her down a little bit, because even at the time then, you know,

04:56Congresswoman Gabbard and Vice President Harris were not on the same level.

05:00So she's always had an uneven debate performance. What we're looking for her to do now,

05:05you know, after four years in the vice presidency, is kind of show that she's no longer the same

05:10person who ran for president four years ago. She's had a lot of experience now on the national stage

05:14and on the international stage. So how does that change her preparation? How,

05:19what does she do going into this? It was uneven in 2020. So her aides and allies are certainly

05:24looking for a more, you know, steady performance this time, this go around.

05:29She's never been great off script, off teleprompter. So that will be the ultimate

05:33test for her. Now, you and I would love these things to come down to policy. They almost

05:38never do, rarely if ever. So what's the X factor here in your estimation? And

05:44what do you make of the much discussed muted mics matter?

05:49Yeah. So that was the big fight heading up into the debate is will mics be muted?

05:53The vice president's campaign wanted them unmuted. And the reason for that is probably

05:58pretty straightforward. They wanted to capture Donald Trump potentially going off the rails.

06:02They wanted people to hear that. You know, in the last debate, when President Joe Biden kind

06:06of fell apart, Trump, A, kind of stepped back and kind of let him damage himself to a degree.

06:10I'm not, you know, I don't want to excuse or just write off all the things that Trump did

06:14in the debate. But President Biden kind of, you know, gave himself the rope in the last debate.

06:20This time, the vice president's camp wanted people to hear Donald Trump and wanted people to hear her

06:24or potentially hear him interrupting and insulting her. They didn't get that.

06:29The mics will be muted, at least to an extent. ABC, the host of the debate, has said to leave

06:34it open, you know, in the middle of crosstalk. But it's kind of all this is expectation setting.

06:40It's all trying to set expectations for members of the media, for members of the public,

06:44on what a good debate performance looks like, both for yourself and for your opponent.

06:49So, you know, all these minute details we'll always forget about, you know,

06:5312 hours after the debate, probably. Who wants the mics muted? Who wants them un-muted? Who

06:56wants them standing? Is it a town hall style? What will really matter for Trump and for Paris is,

07:01you know, those five or 10 standout moments that end up not only happening during the debate,

07:06but get recircled in news coverage and on TV, essentially, as well.

07:12Yeah, let's be honest. It's that one viral tic-tac that's likely a gaffe by one of the

07:17candidates that will ultimately decide this. And who knows, could the race as well.

07:21Political Deputy National Editor Zach Montalero, appreciate it. Enjoy the chat.

07:26Let's talk after this debate and see how we did. Thanks so much.

07:29Thanks for having me.

Category

Transcript

Be the first to comment

Recommended