Here are some highlights from the presidential debate if you missed it!
-
Hillary Clinton is not Bill Clinton, and she’s not Obama. Several of Mr. Trump’s comments and statements criticized the actions of former President Bill Clinton and current President Barack Obama. He often questioned Hillary about her role in both those men’s political careers, as Bill’s First Lady and Barack’s Secretary of State. But Ms. Clinton is her own person. While her actions and political moves in the terms of both Bill Clinton and Barack Obama should certainly be considered by voters, she should not be held responsible for the political decisions of those men.
-
Donald Trump is all about jobs. Several times over the course of the debate, Mr. Trump discussed the outsourcing of American jobs. Trump stated emphatically that the United States needed to protect its job market from companies hoping to outsource labor to China or Mexico for cheaper rates. He emphasized the need to keep these jobs in the United States and bring back some of the outsourced labor of United States companies, but shared few concrete plans for creating new jobs.
-
Hillary Clinton’s email scandal is still being referenced. Ms. Clinton has struggled to get past a scandal which was exposed last year. In March of 2015, Clinton addressed the scandal publically for the first time. While acting as Secretary of State in President Obama’s first term, Ms. Clinton used a personal email account and server for federal affairs and business. This practice was extremely careless and negligent, but technically not criminal. The emails which she did not delete are being slowly released to the public, but this scandal has followed Clinton ever since. When asked about the email scandal in the first presidential debate, she said she would not make excuses and admitted she had made a mistake.
-
Donald Trump has a difficult time holding his tongue. Mr. Trump interrupted Ms. Clinton frequently over the course of the debate, often to say she was wrong. He also talked over the debate moderator, Lester Holt, several times. Both Trump and Clinton cut into each other’s time, responding to accusations and statements made by their opponent. However, Mr. Trump was notably more aggressive, both in his interruption of Ms. Clinton and Mr. Holt. He occasionally even debated Mr. Holt, sometimes denying certain claims which Holt was trying to ask about. Mr. Trump is certainly not afraid to speak his mind, and in this debate he often interrupted both Ms. Clinton and Mr. Holt to make his own points.
-
Hillary Clinton believes we need to increase air strikes against ISIS and take out their leadership. When asked about her plans to fight the terrorist organization ISIS, Ms. Clinton said she supported increased air strikes against the group. She also said she believed that eliminating the leaders of the organization should be a priority when it comes to stopping ISIS. On a related topic, one of the few things Clinton and Trump agreed on was the need to pass a law denying gun ownership rights to individuals on the terror watch list.
-
Donald Trump has yet to release his tax returns. Though a significant portion of his campaign points to Mr. Trump’s expertise in business and finance as one of his most attractive qualities, Mr. Trump has yet to release his tax returns. Though it has been standard for presidents and presidential candidates to release their tax records for nearly forty years, Mr. Trump has not done so. When questioned about it, he made vague claims about not being able to release them while they are audited, though he is at liberty to release them any time, as moderator Lester Holt pointed out. Opponents have suggested that Mr. Trump’s refusal to release his financial information suggests that he may be hiding something, either about who he may owe money to or about whether he is truly as wealthy as he claims.
-
Hillary Clinton suggested better gun safety as the solution to the violence epidemic in America. When asked about the violence on American streets and the tension between law enforcement and communities, particularly black and other minority communities, Ms. Clinton cited gun control and safety as one solution to this problem. She acknowledged the still-existing racial divide in America, saying that a young black man who commits the same offense as a young white man is much more likely to be charged, arrested, and incarcerated for the offense. Ms. Clinton also said she believed in implicit racial bias and the existence of systematic racism. When asked about possible solutions to these problems, particularly in the area of law enforcement, Ms. Clinton mentioned discussions with law enforcement officers and officials who wanted better training and support for police forces.
-
Donald Trump called for law and order when asked about recent conflicts between law enforcement and local communities. Mr. Trump’s answer when asked about violent crime in America and the tension between law enforcement and minority communities was law and order. Though law and order is a vague umbrella, Mr. Trump made note of one or two particular policies. Several times Mr. Trump praised the practice of stop and frisk. This is a law which Merriam-Webster dictionary defines as, “a state law that allows a police officer to stop any person without making an arrest based on a reasonable suspicion that the person has committed or is about to commit a crime”. Debate moderator Lester Holt attempted to point out to Mr. Trump that the stop and frisk law “was ruled unconstitutional in New York, because it largely singled out black and Hispanic young men”. However, Mr. Trump insisted that Mr. Holt was wrong, and continued to emphasize law and order as the solution to police conflict with black and minority communities.
-
Hillary Clinton doesn’t think trickle-down economics work. She stated that some of Mr. Trump’s policy plans would create a trickle-down economic system the likes of which had never before been seen, a system she called “trumped-up trickle-down” economics. She said that she does not believe that trickle-down economics is an effective economic system, and claimed Trump’s system would benefit the rich only. Ms. Clinton said she didn’t believe a top-down economic system worked in America.
10. Donald Trump thinks he has better judgement and a better temperament than Ms. Clinton. Mr. Trump made this claim fairly late into the debate, but it is a striking and important statement. Several times Trump criticized Ms. Clinton’s judgement, particularly in her capacity as Secretary of State. He cited several instances, such as the difficult political situation in the Middle East and Ms. Clinton’s email scandal at home, which he pointed to as signs of her poor judgement. He claimed that he had better judgement than his opponent, as well as a better temperament. It is unclear what exactly he meant when claiming to have a better temperament, though he did also say that Ms. Clinton did not have the stamina needed for the presidential position.