SAUNDERS: ABC News’ Trump-Harris debate was a 3-to-1 affair

WASHINGTON

The debate over the debate is just getting started. Here are a few takes on the ABC News debate between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump.

ABC lost

Everyone knew the ABC News debate would be one-sided. Moderators David Muir and Linsey Davis did nothing to push back against that low-bar expectation, as they joined Harris to make the debate a three-against-one affair.

Harris did not respond to Muir’s opening question — are Americans better off than they were four years ago? Rather than answer, Harris led with her standard talking point about growing up as a “middle class kid.” The moderators’ failure to call her on her non-answer set the stage.

I don’t know what ABC brass were thinking, but I know what they weren’t thinking: How could the network make the debate look even-handed?

One more thing: Trump should have expected as much and brought his A game.

Where was Joe?

Two journalists had a chance to ask Harris about President Joe Biden’s mental capacity after his dismal performance during a June 27 debate with Trump, which ultimately led Biden to end his re-election bid.

Biden has blamed a cold, over-preparation and jet lag from an international trip two weeks earlier for his poor performance during that face-off with Trump. ABC should have asked: Does she agree?

Harris regularly lunches with the president, whom Special Counsel Robert Hur had referred to as a “well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”

Americans have a right to know if the man who will sit in the Oval Office until Jan. 20 is up to the job now.

The failure to press Harris on Biden’s mental capacity was nothing short of journalistic malpractice.

Abortion

Davis asked Trump why American women should trust Trump on abortion, given his evolving positions on a six-week ban for the procedure.

I think Trump gave a good answer — that voters should be able to determine their states’ abortion laws, and thanks to the right-leaning U.S. Supreme Court justices who threw out Roe v. Wade, they do. I remember when letting voters decide big issues was considered a good thing.

Trump challenged the moderators to ask Harris if she would “allow abortion in the eighth month, ninth month, seventh month?”

They did not.

Project 2025

Harris tried to tie Trump to Project 2025, a 922-page document put together by Heritage Foundation staff and other conservatives that lays out a menu of right-of-center policies for a possible Trump second term. Harris called Project 2025 “a detailed and dangerous plan” Trump intends to implement.

Be it noted, Trump has disavowed the conservative template, says he had “nothing to do with it,” hadn’t read it and won’t read it — which probably didn’t go over well with the folks at Heritage.

Immigration

If there is one issue where the American people have soured on Biden, and by extension, Harris, it is immigration.

Biden’s day-one executive orders on immigration essentially invited millions of migrants to cross the U.S. border illegally. Illegal border crossings got so out of control that on June 4 Biden signed an executive order to undercut his earlier orders.

Did the moderators ask Harris about the ticket’s about-face? Yes. But when Harris sidestepped the question, they did not press her for an informative answer.

Instead, the ABC panel drilled down on Harris’ complaint that Trump’s opposition to a border security bill that — after three years of Biden not signing a good executive order — had conservative support, until he opposed it.

The three years of chaos should have been the issue, but that’s just me.

Accountability: Put it on a milk carton

Trump was most effective when he challenged Harris to do more about the border before the Nov. 5 election.

“How come she’s not doing” it? Trump asked.

Because if there is one thing you have to say about Trump, he knew what he wanted to do and he tried to do most of it. After the debate, what Harris would do on these issues remains a mystery.

Contact Review-Journal Washington columnist Debra J. Saunders at dsaunders@reviewjournal.com. Follow @debrajsaunders on X.