Harris, Trump face off in fiery debate

US presidential candidates Donald Trump and Kamala Harris faced off in a contentious presidential debate on Tuesday evening.

Trump pursued bizarre and often falsehood-ridden tangents about crowd sizes, immigration policy and abortion access.

The Philadelphia debate arguably marked the most significant opportunity for both Harris and Trump since Joe Biden withdrew from the presidential race in July, and the event started cordially enough.

Harris approached Trump’s podium to shake his hand and introduce herself, acknowledging that the two presidential candidates had never met in person before Tuesday evening.

However, the cordial atmosphere didn’t last long. After delivering some standard attack lines about the high inflation seen earlier in Biden’s presidency, Trump shifted to mocking Harris as a “Marxist” and promoting baseless claims that Democrats want to “execute the baby” by permitting abortions in the ninth month of pregnancy.

That false claim was corrected by both Harris and ABC News anchor Linsey Davis, who, along with fellow moderator David Muir, fact-checked some of Trump’s statements throughout the evening. Harris then transitioned into a sharp rebuke of Trump’s record on abortion, criticising him for nominating three of the Supreme Court justices who ruled to overturn Roe v Wade in 2022.

“One does not have to abandon their faith or deeply held beliefs to agree that the government and Donald Trump certainly should not be telling a woman what to do with her body,” Harris said. “And I pledge to you, when Parliament passes a bill to reinstate the protections of Roe v Wade, as president of the United States, I will proudly sign it into law.”

Despite broad public support for Roe v Wade, Trump boasted about his role in reversing it and praised the Supreme Court’s “great courage” in delivering its ruling, while he avoided repeated questions about whether he would veto a national abortion ban as president.

Trump seemed to stumble even when moderators asked him about his strongest issues, such as immigration. When questioned about Biden’s handling of the US-Mexico border, Harris shifted the discussion to Trump’s campaign rallies.

“I’m going to invite you to attend one of Donald Trump’s rallies because it’s a really interesting thing to watch,” Harris said. “You will see during the course of his rallies, he talks about fictional characters like Hannibal Lecter. He will talk about [how] windmills cause cancer. And what you will also notice is that people start leaving his rallies early out of exhaustion and boredom. And I will tell you, the one thing you will not hear him talk about is you.”

The diversion seemed a clear attempt by Harris to provoke Trump into arguing over attendance at his rallies rather than focusing on immigration policy – and it worked. Trump began attacking Harris with unfounded claims that her campaign was paying people to attend her rallies while lauding his own events as “the most incredible rallies in the history of politics”.

Instead of focusing on his immigration proposals, Trump proceeded to spread debunked claims that Haitian migrants in an Ohio city had begun capturing and eating their neighbours’ pets.

“They’re eating the dogs. The people that came in, they’re eating the cats,” Trump said. “They’re eating the pets of the people that live there. And this is what’s happening in our country, and it’s a shame.”

The remark quickly became a target of ridicule on social media, with Democrats mocking Trump for “doubling down on the crazy uncle vibe,” as transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg put it.

Although some moments of the debate verged on the absurd, other exchanges concerning foreign policy and the January 6 insurrection carried a more serious tone. When pressed on his false claims of widespread fraud in the 2020 presidential election, Trump again refused to concede his defeat, prompting a stern warning from Harris.

“Donald Trump was rejected by 81 million people, so let’s be clear about that. And, clearly, he is having a very difficult time processing it,” Harris said. “But we cannot afford to have a president of the United States who tries, as he did before, to overturn the will of the voters in a free and fair election.”

On foreign policy, Harris faced tough questions on the war in Gaza, expressing her support for Israel’s “right to defend itself” while also calling for “security, self-determination, and the dignity they so rightly deserve” for Palestinians.

When asked about his position on the war, Trump repeated his bold claims that his presence in the White House would have prevented the wars in both Gaza and Ukraine.

“If I were president, it would have never started,” Trump said. “If I were president, Russia would have never, ever. I know Putin very well. He would have never – and there was no threat of it either, by the way, for four years – have gone into Ukraine.”

However, when directly asked whether he wanted Ukraine to win its war against Russia, Trump avoided the question.

“I want the war to stop,” Trump said. “I think it’s in the US’s best interest to get this war finished and just get it done, all right? Negotiate a deal because we have to stop all of these human lives from being destroyed.”

The debate concluded with Harris pledging to be “a president for all Americans” while Trump labelled her “the worst vice-president in the history of our country”. It was a fitting end for two candidates who presented starkly different visions for the country in what could be their only presidential debate.

No further presidential debates have been officially scheduled, so Tuesday’s encounter might be the last time Harris and Trump face each other before election day.