More stories

  • in

    Al debatir con Trump, las expresiones de Harris fueron un arma

    Serena y sin perder la compostura, Kamala Harris usó sus palabras, y sobre todo su lenguaje corporal, para desestabilizar a Donald Trump, provocar su ira y luego simplemente dejar que se hiciera daño a sí mismo.[Estamos en WhatsApp. Empieza a seguirnos ahora]Ella lo miró con una ceja arqueada. Un suspiro calmado. Una mano en la barbilla. Una risa. Una mirada compasiva. Un movimiento de cabeza desdeñoso.Desde los primeros momentos del debate contra Donald Trump, Kamala Harris explotó hábilmente la mayor debilidad de su oponente.No se centró en su historial. Tampoco en sus políticas divisivas ni en sus múltiples declaraciones incendiarias.En vez de eso, se enfocó en una parte mucho más básica de él: su ego.En sus mítines, en sus serviles redes sociales y cuando está rodeado de aduladores en Mar-a-Lago, a Trump nadie lo cuestiona, nadie le discute, nadie se burla de él.Eso cambió durante 90 minutos el martes en Filadelfia, cuando la mujer que nunca antes se había reunido con él logró, poco a poco, penetrar su seguridad y provocar su enfado y su ira.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

  • in

    Harris and Trump Bet on Their Own Sharply Contrasting Views of America

    Former President Donald J. Trump is gambling that Americans are as angry as he is, while Vice President Kamala Harris hopes voters are exhausted by the Trump era and ready to move on.Donald J. Trump’s America is a grim place, a nation awash in marauding immigrants stealing American jobs and eating American cats and dogs, a country devastated economically, humiliated internationally and perched on the cliff’s edge of an apocalyptic World War III.Kamala Harris’s America is a weary but hopeful place, a nation fed up with the chaos of the Trump years and sick of all the drama and divisiveness, a country embarrassed by a crooked stuck-in-the-past former president facing prison time and eager for a new generation of leadership.These two visions of America on display during the first and possibly only presidential debate between Ms. Harris and Mr. Trump on Tuesday night encapsulated the gambles that each candidate is taking in this hotly contested campaign. Mr. Trump is betting on anger and Ms. Harris on exhaustion. Mr. Trump is trying to repackage and resell his “American carnage” theme eight years later, while Ms. Harris is appealing to those ready to leave that in the past.The question is who has a better read on the American psyche eight weeks before the final ballots are cast. For the past two decades, most Americans have told pollsters that they believe the country is on the wrong track, a prolonged period of national disenchantment that Mr. Trump has successfully channeled throughout his tumultuous political career. But Ms. Harris argues that Mr. Trump is the one who wants to take the nation back down a path to nowhere.“She’s destroying this country,” Mr. Trump declared at one point during the debate. It was a line he recycled in one form or another 13 times in all — she or the Democrats destroying the country, the economy, the energy industry.“Let’s turn the page and move forward,” Ms. Harris said for her part. She turned pages or moved forward at least five other times. “Frankly,” she added, “the American people are exhausted with this same old tired playbook.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

  • in

    Over 90 Minutes, Trump Descended to His True Self

    For the first 10 minutes or so of Tuesday night’s debate, it looked like the restrained version of Donald Trump might have shown up in Philadelphia, the one who learned his lesson from his failure to curb his impulses in the 2020 debates with Joe Biden. He stayed silent while Kamala Harris ripped up his economic plan, which she correctly noted was based on a tax cut for the wealthy and a sales tax on all imported goods. When it was his turn to respond, he accurately pointed out that the Biden administration made no attempt to end the tariffs he imposed on China.But it didn’t last, and no one who has watched Trump over the last decade thought it could. Within minutes, he descended from a discussion of tariffs into a description of immigrants — one he returned to over and over again during the evening — that could only be described as a form of nativist hysteria.“They are taking over the towns,” he said. “They’re taking over buildings. They’re going in violently. These are the people that she and Biden let into our country. And they’re destroying our country. They are dangerous. They’re at the highest level of criminality, and we have to get them out. We have to get them out fast.”This was the level of delusion that Harris and her campaign had clearly hoped Trump would demonstrate to voters, and it just got worse from there. “They’re eating the dogs,” he said, referring to Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, a particularly heinous calumny that began on social media and was spread by his running mate, JD Vance. “The people that came in, they’re eating the cats. They’re eating — they’re eating the pets of the people that live there.” When the moderator David Muir pointed out that local officials had seen nothing of the kind, Trump said he heard about it on television.Throughout the evening, in moments just like that, Harris was able to do something that Biden had failed to do when he was campaigning for re-election: Push Trump in ways that exposed his spattering of lies and wild fantasies.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

  • in

    Trump Repeats False Claim About Immigrants Eating Cats and Dogs

    Former President Donald J. Trump repeated a false and outlandish claim that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, have abducted and eaten their neighbors’ pets.Mr. Trump made the comments on Tuesday early in his first debate against Vice President Kamala Harris, shortly after Ms. Harris mocked his rallies as so filled with fictions and fringe theories that attendees leave early. Mr. Trump responded by trying to pivot back to the subject under discussion, immigration.“A lot of towns don’t want to talk about it because they’re so embarrassed by it,” he said. “In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs. The people that came in, they’re eating the cats. They’re eating — they’re eating the pets of the people that live there.”Mr. Trump and his running mate, Senator JD Vance of Ohio, have amplified the internet rumor on the campaign trail this week. It stems from viral social media posts that have spread as Mr. Vance and others have sought to stir fears about the growing Haitian population in Springfield, though members of the community are living and working in the United States legally.Local officials have found no evidence, credible reports or specific claims of pets being harmed by Haitian residents.When David Muir, a debate moderator, noted the lack of evidence, Mr. Trump said he had gotten his information from “the people on television saying my dog was taken and used for food.”Ms. Harris laughed. Mr. Trump’s “extreme” statements, she said, are one of the reasons she has the endorsements of 200 Republicans.Mr. Vance first made the claim about Haitian immigrants on Monday, saying “it’s coming to your city next.” A news release from the Trump campaign later recounted the falsehoods. Mr. Vance then appeared to backtrack on Tuesday morning in a social post, saying his office had “received many inquiries” about the false claims. But he added that “it’s possible, of course, that all of these rumors will turn out to be false.”That has not stopped the social media platforms from being awash with memes and AI-generated images of cats in support of Mr. Trump.Job opportunities in Springfield, a city of roughly 58,000 people between Columbus and Dayton, have attracted thousands of Haitians since the pandemic began, with city officials estimating that as many as 20,000 have arrived. By some accounts, the immigrant community has helped revitalize the town, though it has put pressure on housing, schools and hospitals. More

  • in

    5 Climate Questions for the Candidates Ahead of the Presidential Debate

    Here’s what the Times climate team would ask Harris and Trump about climate change, energy policy and the environment.As Vice President Kamala Harris and Donald Trump take the stage for their first, and possibly only, debate ahead of the election on Nov. 5, it’s unclear whether or not climate change will be one of the topics they address.The two candidates have diametrically opposed views on the broad outlines of that central issue. Harris has referred to global warming as a “crisis” that needs to be addressed with urgency. Trump has called climate change a hoax and vowed to “drill, baby, drill.”On a number of more specific points, however, Harris and Trump have offered clues to their policy priorities that provide insights into how each might govern should they win.If Times climate reporters and editors were moderating the debate, which is hosted by ABC News, here are five questions we would ask, and some background to inform how each candidate might answer.The United States is currently the world’s biggest producer of both oil and gas, the burning of which are the main contributors to global warming. Would your administration continue working to expand fossil fuel production, or is it time for the U.S. to start moving away from fossil fuels?Harris has walked back her 2019 pledge to ban fracking, a key way of producing oil and gas. Her softening of this stance reflects economic concerns. While the Biden-Harris administration has worked to promote clean energy, it has also benefited from an economy buoyed by record fossil fuel production. Besides fracking, another key area of focus is liquefied natural gas exports. The Biden administration said it would ban new liquefied natural gas export permits, but that decision is being challenged in court.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

  • in

    Debate Trump-Harris: qué podemos esperar

    Los candidatos se preparan para el debate del martes por la noche, el único que tienen programado. Analizamos los aspectos más importantes que podrían discutir.[Estamos en WhatsApp. Empieza a seguirnos ahora]El debate del martes por la noche será el más importante de la carrera política de la vicepresidenta Kamala Harris, ofreciéndole su mayor audiencia hasta el momento, mientras el país intenta saber más detalles sobre qué tipo de presidenta podría ser.El expresidente Donald Trump llega al debate con la esperanza de superar un verano difícil. Harris ha acortado distancias en las encuestas desde que sustituyó al presidente Joe Biden como candidata del Partido Demócrata, y el martes puede ser una de las mejores oportunidades de Trump para revertir ese impulso antes de que los estadounidenses comiencen la votación anticipada.Los colaboradores y partidarios de Harris quieren que provoque al expresidente para que despotrique de manera incoherente. El equipo de Trump quiere que vuelva a centrar la conversación en tres áreas que consideran terreno ganado: la economía, la inmigración y el caos global.Sin más debates programados entre Harris y Trump, el enfrentamiento se perfila como uno de los 90 minutos más cruciales que la política estadounidense ha visto en generaciones.Estos son los factores a los que hay que prestar atención:¿Trump podrá contenerse?Los asesores del expresidente tienen tatuado en la memoria el primer debate de 2020, en el que un Trump sudoroso y confundido por la covid despotricó y desvarió, interrumpiendo a Joe Biden y perdiendo el interés de tantos votantes que sus encuestas descendieron notablemente tras el debate.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

  • in

    Hillary Clinton Debated Trump. Here’s Her Advice for Kamala Harris.

    The 2016 Democratic nominee fell short to Donald Trump, but she had strong debate moments against him. In an interview, she offered some thoughts for Kamala Harris.Hillary Clinton has as much experience as any Democrat in debating Donald J. Trump.The 2016 presidential campaign, when she was her party’s nominee, included three of the six general-election debates Mr. Trump has participated in. Those faceoffs went a long way toward shaping the country’s vision of his candidacy and what he would be like as president.Mr. Trump, of course, went on to win the 2016 election — an outcome that still haunts Democrats.When Mrs. Clinton called this week to discuss her old debate coach, Karen Dunn, who is helping out Vice President Kamala Harris this time around, I took the opportunity to ask about her experience on the debate stage with Mr. Trump.“The consensus was that I won all three debates and that I was well prepared,” Mrs. Clinton said.Here are excerpts from our conversation, which have been lightly edited and condensed.What do you remember about your own preparations to debate Donald Trump?It was the first debate when Trump literally ridiculed me for preparing. This was not something we had thought about beforehand, because who thought we could be ridiculed for preparing for a presidential debate in front of 85 or 90 million people?So basically I said, yeah, I did prepare. And I’ll tell you something else I prepared for: I prepared to be president. Because I had the confidence. I knew the material. I felt comfortable. I also knew I had to brush Trump back and not let him be the center of attention all the time.What advice do you have for Kamala Harris as she prepares to debate Trump?She’s proven to be a good debater, both in her races in California and in her debate with Mike Pence. So I think she needs to be prepared enough that she feels really comfortable going on both offense and defense against Trump, because there’s a lot to cover with him.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

  • in

    Harris’s Debate Tutor: a Lawyer Unafraid of Telling Politicians Hard Truths

    Karen Dunn, who is preparing the vice president for next week’s clash, has trained Democrats for debates in every election since 2008. Her approach, as Hillary Clinton put it, is “tough love.”Vice President Kamala Harris has never met or spoken with former President Donald J. Trump, but the woman running her debate preparations has spent a lot of time thinking about how to respond to what Republican nominees say during an onstage clash.That outside Harris adviser, Karen L. Dunn, a high-powered Washington lawyer, has trained Democratic presidential and vice-presidential candidates for debates in every election since 2008.She is described by candidates she has coached and other people who have worked with her as a skilled handler of high-ego politicians. By all accounts, she possesses the rare ability to tell them what they are doing wrong and how to fix it — and how to inject humor and humanity to sell themselves to voters watching the debate.“It’s a combination of tough love,” Hillary Clinton, whom Ms. Dunn helped prepare for presidential debates in 2008 and 2016, said in an interview on Thursday. “She’s unafraid to say, ‘That’s not going to work’ or ‘That doesn’t make sense’ or ‘You can do better.’ But she also offers encouragement, like, ‘Look, I think you’re on the right track here’ and ‘You just need to do more of that.’”The emergence of Ms. Dunn as the leader of Ms. Harris’s debate team comes at a critical moment in both the presidential race and Ms. Dunn’s professional life.When she is not preparing top Democrats for debates — in addition to her four previous cycles of involvement at the presidential and vice-presidential level, she has worked with Senators Mark Warner of Virginia and Cory Booker of New Jersey — Ms. Dunn is a top lawyer for some of America’s leading technology firms.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More