It Looks Like Trump May Have Helped Himself in the Debate

I don't think it helps to just say what people want to hear. The truth matters. And the truth is that it was not a great debate for Donald Trump on Tuesday night. I suspect he did little to no debate prep in advance, and every time Kamala baited him, he took the bait.

It goes without saying that Kamala Harris lied her way through the debate, but the moderators didn't fact-check her once, yet Trump was "fact-checked" between five and seven times — and the fact-checks weren't always accurate.

Perhaps because of what I do for a living, I'm extra critical of Donald Trump's performance. I've been pointing out for days now what Trump needed to do in the debate, and seeing him miss opportunity after opportunity was beyond frustrating. But according to a report from Reuters, undecided voters largely shifted to him after the debate. 

"Kamala Harris was widely seen as dominating Tuesday's presidential debate against Republican former president Donald Trump, but a group of undecided voters remained unconvinced that the Democratic vice president was the better candidate," the outlet reported.

Reuters interviewed ten undecided voters before and after a debate. Six of them shifted toward supporting Trump, three leaned toward Harris, and one remained uncertain. That's a rather solid outcome for Trump.

"Although the sample size was small, the responses suggested Harris might need to provide more detailed policy proposals to win over voters who have yet to make up their minds," wrote Reuters.

It gets worse for Kamala.

Five said they found Harris vague during the more than 90-minute debate on how she would improve the U.S. economy and deal with the high cost of living, a top concern for voters.

The encounter was particularly important for Harris, with a weekend New York Times/Siena College opinion poll showing that more than a quarter of likely voters feel they do not know enough about her, in contrast to the well-known Trump.

The Trump converts said they trusted him more on the economy, even though all said they did not like him as a person. They said their personal financial situation had been better when he was president between 2017-2021. Some singled out his proposal to tax foreign imports, although economists say that is likely to raise prices.

Four of those six also said Harris did not convince them she would pursue different economic policies than Democratic President Joe Biden, a Democrat they largely blame for the high cost of living.

"I still don't know what she is for," said Mark Kadish, 61, an entrepreneur in Florida. "There was no real meat and bones for her plans."

Four of the voters are women and six are men; eight are white and two are Black. All have voted for both Democratic and Republican candidates in the past.

[...]

Robert Wheeler, 48, a security firm executive in Nevada, was leaning toward Harris before the debate. He now says if the election were held tomorrow he would vote for Trump, largely because he thought Harris didn't provide clarity on her policies.

"I felt like the whole debate was Kamala Harris telling me why not to vote for Donald Trump instead of why she's the right candidate," Wheeler said.

I'm not going to lie; this result shocks me. My impression was that this debate likely wouldn't move the needle all that much, if at all, but if this sample is indicative of a larger trend, Donald Trump actually succeeded in doing what he needed to do.

Previous: Five Takeaways From the Trump-Harris Debate

Of course, some will point to various polls saying that Kamala won the debate. And that may be true, but winning a debate doesn't necessarily translate into winning over voters. With the exception of Trump's debate with Joe Biden in June, I can't think of a time when the media ever didn't push the narrative that Trump lost a debate. According to them, he lost all of his debates with Hillary Clinton in 2016 and all of his debates with Joe Biden in 2020. Perhaps winning the debate isn't the goal candidates should be striving for. Perhaps the real goal is winning over undecided voters. And if this Reuters survey is any indication, Trump achieved that.