Candidates Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump faced off in the first of three presidential debates on Monday, September 26. Many analyst say Clinton emerged victorious.
CNN reports Clinton strategically criticized Trump on many issues. To quote one of CNN’s articles, “Trump took the bait, repeatedly interrupting angrily or dismissively throughout the night.”
Analyst have said Clinton’s attacks were designed to get a rise out of Trump, and they did. Consequently, Trump portrayed himself as short-tempered and less than presidential.
Regardless of strategy though, the most important part of a debate is its substance. Here are some important things to take away from the first debate.
Trump criticized over tax returns
Donald Trump still has not released his tax returns, and moderator Lester Holt made it a point to question Trump on the issue.
“The reason nominees have released their returns for decades is that voters will know if their potential president owes money, who they owe it to, and if there are any business conflicts,” Holt said. “Don’t Americans have a right to know if there are any conflicts of interests?”
Trump responded by saying he doesn’t mind releasing his returns and added that he will do so as soon as a “routine audit” is completed.
Holt then fact checked Trump by pointing out that he is perfectly able to release his tax returns during an audit. Clinton took the opportunity to question Trump’s motives and implied that he’ hiding something.
“Maybe he doesn’t want the American people to know he has paid nothing in federal taxes,” Clinton said.
Trump shot back, saying he will release as soon as Clinton releases "her 33,000 emails that have been deleted."
Clinton’s economic policy
One of Trump’s best moments in the debate came when he denounced Clinton’s plans for economic growth. He pointed out Clinton’s previous support of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which she now opposes. Trump portrayed Clinton as an inactive politician who’s 30 years in Washington have done little to improve the economy.
“You’ve been doing this for 30 years,” said Trump. “Why are you just thinking about these solutions right now?”
Clinton calls for fact-checkers
Clinton likely anticipated that Trump would be less prepared for the debate than she was. She also anticipated that Trump would spread falsities throughout the debate.
Clinton called on the American people to fact check Trump’s words several times and even converted her website to an online fact-checker that corrected Trump in real time.
The strategy paid off more than once during the debate. For one, Trump denied he ever endorsed the invasion of Iraq, even as Holt cited an 2002 interview which said otherwise. Trump also denied his claim that climate change was created by China for economic benefit. Yet, in 2012, he tweeted, "The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.”
Trump’s tax plan
“Under my plan, I’ll be reducing taxes tremendously from 35 percent to 15 percent for companies,” Trump said.
Clinton called Trump’s plan a form of ineffective trickle down economics.
“I call it Trumped up, trickle down,” she said with a smirk.
The next debate will air on October 9, followed by the third and final debate on October 19.
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