Trump-Harris debate updates: Candidates go on the attack in zinger-filled showdown
Harris and Trump sparred in the high-stakes showdown.
The first presidential debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump turned into a heated matchup that lasted more than 90 minutes.
The night started with a handshake initiated by Harris, but quickly escalated as the vice president bashed Trump over his policies and comments, contending that it was time to "offer is a new generation of leadership for our country."
Trump criticized Harris throughout the debate on topics such as Afghanistan and immigration issues, drawing comparisons between the vice president and President Joe Biden.
With Election Day just eight weeks away, the debate came at a critical point as polls show a neck-and-neck race between the candidates.
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A transcript of the Harris-Trump debate
Harris and Trump met for their first presidential debate on Tuesday night. The consequential matchup was hosted by ABC News at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia.
Read a transcript of what was said in the 90-minute debate here.
CLAIM: 'Iran was broke under Donald Trump. Now Iran has $300 billion because they took off all the sanctions that I had.'
Fact Check: Mostly false, needs context
Trump claimed that if he was in office, Hamas’ October 7th attack on Israel never would have happened because the terror group’s chief sponsor, Iran, “had no money for terror.” However, Iran has been Hamas’ principal backer for decades, including through the Trump presidency. Records retrieved from inside Gaza by the Israeli Defense Forces and verified by independent news outlets indicate Tehran funneled tens of millions of dollars during the Trump administration. Two of Trump’s top advisers for Middle Eastern affairs also claimed that Iran was supplying Hamas and other Palestinian terror groups with $100 million each year in an op-ed published in 2019.
Trump also said that Iran gained $300 billion because the Biden-Harris administration “took off all the sanctions I had” on Iran.
The current administration has maintained and even levied new sanctions against Iran, but during its attempt to renegotiate an Obama-era nuclear deal that Trump exited in 2018, the U.S. did ease the enforcement of some sanctions and restore a U.N waiver that allowed companies from other countries to conduct non-proliferation work at Iranian nuclear sites.
According to shipping data, Iran’s oil exports—its chief source of revenue—have climbed during the last four years. But experts estimate than Tehran has been able to accrue around $100 billion at most during President Biden’s term, which is substantially less than Trump’s figure of $300 billion.
Trump says he had a great debate
Trump entered the spin room after the debate, claiming he had a great debate and continued to slam Harris over her policies.
He also said he was open to debating Harris again.
Sen. Murphy says Trump ‘was a puddle by the end of the night,’ Harris looked like a leader
Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy offered a scathing critique of Trump’s performance, telling reporters that viewers “only saw one president on stage” and that “Donald Trump was a puddle by the end of the night,” while “Kamala Harris got stronger as the debate went on. She looked like a leader, not just of the United States of America, but of the free world.”
—538's Tia Yang
CLAIM: 'As of today, there is not one member of the United States military who is an active duty in a combat zone, in any war zone around the world, the first time this century.'
Fact check: False
Harris appears to be using a narrow definition of what constitutes a combat zone, because there are U.S. military troops in the Middle East who have come under deadly fire over the last year.
There are currently 2,500 U.S. military troops in Iraq and more than 900 U.S. military personnel in Syria who are on a mission to support local forces to prevent a resurgence by ISIS. While the troops in both countries are mostly involved in an advisory role some of them are also engaged in risky counterterrorism missions against ISIS.
But the real threat to these troops over the past year were the repeated attacks against U.S. bases in both countries by Iranian-backed militia groups that launched more than 170 rocket and drone attacks. But it was an attack on a U.S. base in neighboring Jordan this past January that has proven to be the most costly. Three U.S. Soldiers were killed and 34 others were wounded when a drone launched by those militia groups made it past air defense systems. That attack led the Biden administration to order large-scale retaliatory airstrikes against the Iranian-backed militia groups.