‘I’ve never seen anything like this’: Tensions run high in first presidential debate
Presidency scholar Lori Cox Han and political science Chair John Compton spoke on the egregious nature of the Sept. 29 presidential debate. WikiCommons
The presidential debate Sept. 29 left some viewers asking more questions than they had going in.
In a heated back-and-forth exchange between President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden, the two clashed over topics like COVID-19, racial tensions, law and order and election integrity. Lori Cox Han, a Chapman University presidency scholar, said after the number of altercations between the candidates, the next few debates might not add sustenance to either campaign.
“I’m not sure some of the questions at this point are going to even matter that much, because I’m not sure that the answers we will get will be all that informative,” Han said at the post-debate discussion led by Civic Engagement Initiatives. “We’ve all become so desensitized in this media environment that we all kind of assume that a lot of the information we’re hearing isn’t necessarily true, and I think sometimes fact-checking gets lumped in with that.”
When Trump did not explicitly denounce white supremacy and instead asserted that “almost everything I see is from the left wing,” Biden himself was quick to note FBI Director Christopher Wray had identified antifa as an ideological group, not a militia. Members of Proud Boys, a hate-group classified by the Southern Poverty Law Center for its endorsement of violence, are now celebrating after Trump addressed the organization to “stand back and stand by.”
“He clearly somehow believes that his campaign’s about to suffer if he unambiguously denounces white nationalists or white supremacists, and as you saw tonight, he wouldn’t do it,” said John Compton, chair of Chapman’s political science department.
Trump intentionally tried and, in some cases, succeeded at throwing Biden off, Han said. On multiple occasions Biden and Trump scoffed at one another, and while Han suggested it wasn’t surprising behavior for Trump to interject with aggression, Biden didn’t help his own campaign by retaliating with names such as “clown” or phrases like, “Shut up, man.”
“I would have advised Biden to not engage with Trump in the personal attacks, and to just remain calm,” Han told The Panther. “There’s so many Democrats who think getting the low blows against Trump are the way to go and I just think, ‘No, because you’re just legitimizing his behavior; don’t engage in it.’”
Fox News debate moderator Chris Wallace attempted to rein in the disputes not more than 10 minutes into the programming. He did so several times during the heated 90-minute debate, reminding the candidates that their campaigns both agreed to two minutes of uninterrupted responses.
“I’ve never seen anything like this,” Compton said. “Occasionally people would go over their time limit, but the notion that you constantly just yell across the stage at your opponent … the format just doesn’t work.”
Trump came under fire for a recent New York Times investigative report that found he had paid $750 in federal income taxes in both 2016 and 2017, although he claimed at the debate he’s paid “millions.” Biden didn’t get off scot-free either; during the debate’s “law and order” segment, the president confronted the former Senate Judiciary Committee chairman for co-writing and endorsing the 1994 crime bill.
The vice-presidential debate will be held Oct. 7 at 6 p.m. PDT. Vice President Mike Pence and California Sen. Kamala Harris will be debating one another in Salt Lake City, Utah. Han and Compton both questioned whether the upcoming debates will make much of an impact on swing voters and voter turnout for the general election.
“I don’t think we saw anything from Trump on that debate stage that we haven’t already seen,” Han said. “The shock factor of Trump has worn off, and I think that says an awful lot about our political environment right now.”