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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Donald Trump and his Democratic challenger, former Vice President Joe Biden, clashed in their first campaign debate in Cleveland on Tuesday, with Trump talking about his rival and the moderator as he sought to keep the spotlight.
Here are some takeaways from the showdown, the first of three before the November 3 election:
‘WILL YOU SHUT UP, MAN?’
Trump is used to training with reporters and spent Tuesday’s debate using the same tactic he uses in the White House meeting room: interrupting.
Throughout the 90-minute debate, Trump repeatedly spoke about Biden and Fox News moderator Chris Wallace, overshadowing attempts to discuss the policy and generating reprimands for breaking the rules that both campaigns had agreed to to ensure both candidates had the same. weather.
The split-screen debate regularly featured the two candidates speaking simultaneously as Wallace called for order.
“Please let the vice president speak,” Wallace admonished Trump during one of his interruptions.
“Do you want to shut up, man?” Biden told Trump, one of the many times he ordered the president to shut up.
The effect was exhausting, for viewers and, apparently, for the moderator, who admitted at one point that he was having trouble following.
“That was too hot,” Chris Christie, the combative former New Jersey Republican governor and Trump adviser, said on ABC, while criticizing Biden’s performance.
“It’s been an interesting hour and a half,” Wallace said, ending the debate with a smile and, nodding to the follow-up discussions in the coming weeks, said there was more to come.
‘TURN OFF AND WAIT’
Trump deflected a question that asked him to condemn white supremacists and militia groups, instead asking one group to “stand aside and stay out” and then attack left activists.
Senior federal officials, including the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security, warned this month that white supremacist groups pose a growing threat of violence in the United States.
BODY LANGUAGE
There was no opening handshake Tuesday night due to COVID-19, but the body language between Trump and Biden still took center stage.
Trump scowled at his rival for much of the debate, or wagged or waved his hand to fire his Democratic opponent.
Meanwhile, Biden regularly looked at the camera when Trump interrupted him to make a direct appeal to the American people.
Trump “doesn’t want to talk about what he needs – you, the American people. It’s about you,” Biden said at one point.
As Trump spoke, Biden shook his head, sometimes breaking into a smile or laughing, and occasionally just stopping talking and becoming quiet, exasperated.
TRUMP TAXES
Trump didn’t mince words when Wallace asked him how much he paid in federal income taxes in 2016 and 2017, after the New York Times reported that his tax returns showed only one payment of $ 750 each year.
Without offering proof, Trump said he had paid “millions of dollars. And they will see it,” despite his refusal to release statements since he became a candidate in 2015, breaking decades of tradition.
“Show us your tax returns,” interjected Biden.
Trump tried to walk a fine line, claiming he owed a large tax bill while defending his efforts to pay as little tax as possible, and blaming Biden and former President Barack Obama for helping him do so through code. tax.
When Wallace turned to Biden, the Democrat swiftly turned to his economic plan, saying he would repeal Trump’s tax cuts that greatly benefited corporations and the wealthy, and the discussion centered on the trillions of dollars those represent. proposals.
Many of the allegations were not mentioned in the Times report: tax deductions for hairstyle and private jets, no income tax paid in 10 of the last 15 years, a massive $ 72.9 million tax refund that is subject to of a long-term audit.
It may have been a missed opportunity for Biden. She has worked hard to reach white working-class voters in the heart of Trump’s base, who might be particularly offended by Trump’s miniscule tax payments.
GUEST LIST
Presidential candidates invite guests to debates with a calculated purpose: to emphasize a central theme of the campaign.
Ann Dorn, whose husband, a retired police officer, was killed amid anti-racism protests in St. Louis in June, was among Trump’s guests, a month after appearing in a video on his behalf at the Republican National Convention. . Trump has criticized a “law and order” message in response to widespread civil unrest over police brutality and racism and accused Democrats of not supporting law enforcement.
Biden’s guests included Kristin Urquiza, whose father, a Trump supporter, died of the coronavirus after ruling out its fatality. The former vice president has sought as far as possible to turn the campaign into a referendum on Trump, and specifically on his handling of the outbreak, which has killed more than 205,000 Americans.
(Reporting by Jeff Mason in Washington and Joseph Ax in Princeton, NJ; Editing by Scott Malone, Peter Cooney, and Cynthia Osterman)
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