September 10, 2024
PARTICIPANTS:Vice President Kamala Harris (D) andFormer President Donald Trump (R)
MODERATORS:Linsey Davis (ABC News) andDavid Muir (ABC News)
MUIR: Good evening, I'm David Muir. And thank you for joining us for tonight's ABC News Presidential Debate. We want to welcome viewers watching on ABC and around the world tonight. Vice President Kamala Harris and President Donald Trump are just moments away from taking the stage in this unprecedented race for president.
DAVIS: And I'm Linsey Davis. Tonight's meeting could be the most consequential event of their campaigns, with Election Day now less than two months away. For Vice President Kamala Harris, this is her first debate since President Biden withdrew from the race on July 21st. Of course, that decision followed his debate against President Donald Trump in June. Since then, this race has taken on an entirely new dynamic.
MUIR: And that brings us to the rules of tonight's debate: 90 minutes with two commercial breaks. No topics or questions have been shared with the campaigns. The candidates will have two minutes to answer questions. And this is the clock. That's what they'll be seeing. Two minutes for rebuttals and one minute for follow-ups, clarifications or responses. Their microphones will only be turned on when it's their turn to speak. No prewritten notes allowed. There is no audience here tonight in this hall at the National Constitution Center. This is an intimate setting for two candidates who have never met.
DAVIS: President Trump won the coin toss. He chose to deliver the final closing statement of the evening. Vice President Harris selected the podium to the right.
MUIR: So let's now welcome the candidates to the stage. Vice President Kamala Harris and President Donald Trump.
HARRIS: Kamala Harris. Let's have a good debate.
TRUMP: Nice to see you. Have fun.
HARRIS: Thank you.
TRUMP: Thank you.
MUIR: Welcome to you both. It's wonderful to have you. It's an honor to have you both here tonight.
DAVIS: Good evening, we are looking forward to a spirited and thoughtful debate.
MUIR: So let's get started. I want to begin tonight with the issue voters repeatedly say is their number one issue, and that is the economy and the cost of living in this country. Vice President Harris, you and President Trump were elected four years ago and your opponent on the stage here tonight often asks his supporters, are you better off than you were four years ago? When it comes to the economy, do you believe Americans are better off than they were four years ago?
HARRIS: So, I was raised as a middle-class kid. And I am actually the only person on this stage who has a plan that is about lifting up the middle class and working people of America. I believe in the ambition, the aspirations, the dreams of the American people. And that is why I imagine and have actually a plan to build what I call an opportunity economy. Because here's the thing. We know that we have a shortage of homes and housing, and the cost of housing is too expensive for far too many people. We know that young families need support to raise their children. And I intend on extending a tax cut for those families of $6,000, which is the largest child tax credit that we have given in a long time. So that those young families can afford to buy a crib, buy a car seat, buy clothes for their children. My passion, one of them, is small businesses. I was actually -- my mother raised my sister and me but there was a woman who helped raise us. We call her our second mother. She was a small business owner. I love our small businesses. My plan is to give a $50,000 tax deduction to start-up small businesses, knowing they are part of the backbone of America's economy. My opponent, on the other hand, his plan is to do what he has done before, which is to provide a tax cut for billionaires and big corporations, which will result in $5 trillion to America's deficit. My opponent has a plan that I call the Trump sales tax, which would be a 20% tax on everyday goods that you rely on to get through the month. Economists have said that Trump's sales tax would actually result for middle-class families in about $4,000 more a year because of his policies and his ideas about what should be the backs of middle-class people paying for tax cuts for billionaires.
MUIR: President Trump, I'll give you two minutes.
TRUMP: First of all, I have no sales tax. That's an incorrect statement. She knows that. We're doing tariffs on other countries. Other countries are going to finally, after 75 years, pay us back for all that we've done for the world. And the tariff will be substantial in some cases. I took in billions and billions of dollars, as you know, from China. In fact, they never took the tariff off because it was so much money, they can't. It would totally destroy everything that they've set out to do. They've taken in billions of dollars from China and other places. They've left the tariffs on. When I had it, I had tariffs and yet I had no inflation. Look, we've had a terrible economy because inflation has -- which is really known as a country buster. It breaks up countries. We have inflation like very few people have ever seen before. Probably the worst in our nation's history. We were at 21%. But that's being generous because many things are 50, 60, 70, and 80% higher than they were just a few years ago. This has been a disaster for people, for the middle class, but for every class. On top of that, we have millions of people pouring into our country from prisons and jails, from mental institutions and insane asylums. And they're coming in and they're taking jobs that are occupied right now by African Americans and Hispanics and also unions. Unions are going to be affected very soon. And you see what's happening. You see what's happening with towns throughout the United States. You look at Springfield, Ohio. You look at Aurora in Colorado. They are taking over the towns. 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're dangerous. They're at the highest level of criminality. And we have to get them out. We have to get them out fast. I created one of the greatest economies in the history of our country. I'll do it again and even better.
MUIR: We are going to get to immigration and border security during this debate. But I would like to let Vice President Harris respond on the economy here.
HARRIS: Well, I would love to. Let's talk about what Donald Trump left us. Donald Trump left us the worst unemployment since the Great Depression. Donald Trump left us the worst public health epidemic in a century. Donald Trump left us the worst attack on our democracy since the Civil War. And what we have done is clean up Donald Trump's mess. What we have done and what I intend to do is build on what we know are the aspirations and the hopes of the American people. But I'm going to tell you all, in this debate tonight, you're going to hear from the same old, tired playbook, a bunch of lies, grievances and name-calling. What you're going to hear tonight is a detailed and dangerous plan called Project 2025 that the former president intends on implementing if he were elected again. I believe very strongly that the American people want a president who understands the importance of bringing us together knowing we have so much more in common than what separates us. And I pledge to you to be a president for all Americans.
MUIR: President Trump, I'll give you a minute here to respond.
TRUMP: Number one, I have nothing to do, as you know and as she knows better than anyone, I have nothing to do with Project 2025. That's out there. I haven't read it. I don't want to read it, purposely. I'm not going to read it. This was a group of people that got together, they came up with some ideas. I guess some good, some bad. But it makes no difference. I have nothing to do -- everybody knows I'm an open book. Everybody knows what I'm going to do. Cut taxes very substantially. And create a great economy like I did before. We had the greatest economy. We got hit with a pandemic. And the pandemic was, not since 1917 where 100 million people died has there been anything like it? We did a phenomenal job with the pandemic. We handed them over a country where the economy and where the stock market was higher than it was before the pandemic came in. Nobody's ever seen anything like it. We made ventilators for the entire world. We got gowns. We got masks. We did things that nobody thought possible. And people give me credit for rebuilding the military. They give me credit for a lot of things. But not enough credit for the great job we did with the pandemic. But the only jobs they got were bounce-back jobs. These were jobs, bounce back. And it bounced back and it went to their benefit. But I was the one that created them. They know it and so does everybody else.
MUIR: Vice President Harris, I'll let you respond.
HARRIS: So, Donald Trump has no plan for you. And when you look at his economic plan, it's all about tax breaks for the richest people. I am offering what I describe as an opportunity economy, and the best economists in our country, if not the world, have reviewed our relative plans for the future of America. What Goldman Sachs has said is that Donald Trump's plan would make the economy worse. Mine would strengthen the economy. What the Wharton School has said is Donald Trump's plan would actually explode the deficit. Sixteen Nobel laureates have described his economic plan as something that would increase inflation and by the middle of next year would invite a recession. You just have to look at where we are and where we stand on the issues. And I'd invite you to know that Donald Trump actually has no plan for you, because he is more interested in defending himself than he is in looking out for you.
TRUMP: That's just a sound bite. They gave her that to say. Look, I went to the Wharton School of Finance and many of those professors, the top professors, think my plan is a brilliant plan, it's a great plan. It's a plan that's going to bring up our worth, our value as a country. It's going to make people want to be able to go and work and create jobs and create a lot of good, solid money for our -- for our country. And just to finish off, she doesn't have a plan. She copied Biden's plan. And it's like four sentences, like run-Spot-run. Four sentences that are just oh, we'll try and lower taxes. She doesn't have a plan. Take a look at her plan. She doesn't have a plan.
MUIR: Mr. President, I do want to drill down on something you both brought up. The vice president brought up your tariffs you responded and let's drill down on this because your plan is what she calls is a essentially a national sales tax. Your proposal calls for tariffs as you pointed out here, on foreign imports across the board. You recently said that you might double your plan, imposing tariffs up to 20% on good coming into this country. As you know many economists say that with tariffs at that level costs are then passed onto the consumer. Vice President Harris has argued it'll mean higher prices on gas, food, clothing medication arguing it costs the typical family nearly four thousand dollars a year. Do you believe Americans can afford higher prices because of tariffs.
TRUMP: They aren't gonna have higher prices what's gonna have and who's gonna have higher prices is China and all of the countries that have been ripping us off for years. I charge, I was the only president ever China was paying us hundreds of billions of dollars and so were other countries and you know if she doesn't like 'em they should have gone out and they should have immediately cut the tariffs but those tariffs are there three and a half years now under their administration. We are gonna take in billions of dollars, hundreds of billions of dollars. I had no inflation, virtually no inflation, they had the highest inflation, perhaps in the history of our country because I've never seen a worse period of time. People can't go out and buy cereal bacon or eggs or anything else. These the people of our country are absolutely dying with what they've done. They've destroyed the economy and all you have to do it look at a poll. The polls say 80 and 85 and even 90% that the Trump economy was great that their economy was terrible.
MUIR: Vice President Harris I do want to ask for your response and you heard what the president said there because the Biden administration did keep a number of the Trump tariffs in place so how do you respond?
HARRIS: Well, let's be clear that the Trump administration resulted in a trade deficit, one of the highest we've ever seen in the history of America. He invited trade wars, you wanna talk about his deal with China what he ended up doing is under Donald Trump's presidency he ended up selling American chips to China to help them improve and modernize their military basically sold us out when a policy about China should be in making sure the United States of America wins the competition for the 21st century. Which means focusing on the details of what that requires, focusing on relationships with our allies, focusing on investing in American based technology so that we win the race on A.I. and quantum computing, focusing on what we need to do to support America's workforce, so that we don't end up having the on the short end of the stick in terms of workers' rights. But what Donald Trump did let's talk about this with COVID, is he actually thanked President XI for what he did during COVID. Look at his tweet. "Thank you, President XI," exclamation point. When we know that XI was responsible for lacking and not giving us transparency about the origins of COVID.
MUIR: President Trump, I'll let you respond.
TRUMP: First of all, they bought their chips from Taiwan. We hardly make chips anymore because of philosophies like they have and policies like they have. I don't say her because she has no policy. Everything that she believed three years ago and four years ago is out the window. She's going to my philosophy now. In fact, I was going to send her a MAGA hat. She's gone to my philosophy. But if she ever got elected, she'd change it. And it will be the end of our country. She's a Marxist. Everybody knows she's a Marxist. Her father's a Marxist professor in economics. And he taught her well. But when you look at what she's done to our country and when you look at these millions and millions of people that are pouring into our country monthly where it's I believe 21 million people, not the 15 that people say, and I think it's a lot higher than the 21. That's bigger than New York state. Pouring in. And just look at what they're doing to our country. They're criminals. Many of these people coming in are criminals. And that's bad for our economy too. You mentioned before, we'll talk about immigration later.
Well, bad immigration is the worst thing that can happen to our economy. They have and she has destroyed our country with policy that's insane. Almost policy that you'd say they have to hate our country.
MUIR: President trump, thank you. Linsey?
DAVIS: I want to turn to the issue of abortion. President Trump, you've often touted that you were able to kill Roe V. Wade. Last year, you said that you were proud to be the most pro-life president in American history. Then last month you said that your administration would be great for women and their reproductive rights. In your home state of Florida, you surprised many with regard to your six-week abortion ban because you initially had said that it was too short and you said, "I'm going to be voting that we need more than six weeks." But then the very next day, you reversed course and said you would vote to support the six-week ban. Vice President Harris says that women shouldn't trust you on the issue of abortion because you've changed your position so many times. Therefore, why should they trust you?
TRUMP: Well, the reason I'm doing that vote is because the plan is, as you know, the vote is, they have abortion in the ninth month. They even have, and you can look at the governor of West Virginia, the previous governor of West Virginia, not the current governor, who's doing an excellent job, but the governor before. He said the baby will be born and we will decide what to do with the baby. In other words, we'll execute the baby.
And that's why I did that, because that predominates. Because they're radical. The Democrats are radical in that. And her vice presidential pick, which I think was a horrible pick, by the way for our country, because he is really out of it. But her vice presidential pick says abortion in the ninth month is absolutely fine. He also says execution after birth, it's execution, no longer abortion, because the baby is born, is okay. And that's not okay with me. Hence the vote. But what I did is something for 52 years they've been trying to get Roe V. Wade into the states.
And through the genius and heart and strength of six supreme court justices we were able to do that. Now, I believe in the exceptions for rape, incest and life of the mother. I believe strongly in it. Ronald Reagan did also. 85% of Republicans do. Exceptions. Very important. But we were able to get it. And now states are voting on it. And for the first time you're going to see -- look, this is an issue that's torn our country apart for 52 years. Every legal scholar, every Democrat, every Republican, liberal, conservative, they all wanted this issue to be brought back to the states where the people could vote. And that's what happened, happened. Now, Ohio, the vote was somewhat liberal. Kansas the vote was somewhat liberal. Much more liberal than people would have thought. But each individual state is voting. It's the vote of the people now. It's not tied up in the federal government. I did a great service in doing it. It took courage to do it. And the supreme court had great courage in doing it. And I give tremendous credit to those six justices.
DAVIS: There is no state in this country where it is legal to kill a baby after it's born. Madam vice president, I want to get your response to President Trump.
HARRIS: Well, as I said, you're going to hear a bunch of lies. And that's not actually a surprising fact. Let's understand how we got here. Donald Trump hand-selected three members of the United States Supreme Court with the intention that they would undo the protections of Roe V. Wade. And they did exactly as he intended. And now in over 20 states there are Trump abortion bans which make it criminal for a doctor or nurse to provide health care. In one state it provides prison for life. Trump abortion bans that make no exception even for rape and incest. Which understand what that means. A survivor of a crime, a violation to their body, does not have the right to make a decision about what happens to their body next. That is immoral. And one does not have to abandon their faith or deeply held beliefs to agree the government, and Donald Trump certainly, should not be telling a woman what to do with her body.
I have talked with women around our country. You want to talk about this is what people wanted? Pregnant women who want to carry a pregnancy to term suffering from a miscarriage, being denied care in an emergency room because the health care providers are afraid they might go to jail and she's bleeding out in a car in the parking lot? She didn't want that. Her husband didn't want that. A 12 or 13-year-old survivor of incest being forced to carry a pregnancy to term? They don't want that. And I pledge to you when Congress passes a bill to put back in place the protections of Roe V. Wade as president of the United States, I will proudly sign it into law. But understand, if Donald Trump were to be re-elected, he will sign a national abortion ban. Understand in his project 2025 there would be a national abortion ban. Understand in his project 2025 there would be a national abortion -- a monitor that would be monitoring your pregnancies, your miscarriages. I think the American people believe that certain freedoms, in particular the freedom to make decisions about one's own body, should not be made by the government.
DAVIS: Thank you, Vice President Harris.
TRUMP: Well, there she goes again. It's a lie. I'm not signing a ban. And there's no reason to sign a ban. Because we've gotten what everybody wanted. Democrats, Republicans and everybody else and every legal scholar wanted it to be brought back into the states. And the states are voting. And it may take a little time, but for 52 years this issue has torn our country apart. And they've wanted it back in the states. And I did something that nobody thought was possible. The states are now voting. What she says is an absolute lie. And as far as the abortion ban, no, I'm not in favor of abortion ban. But it doesn't matter because this issue has now been taken over by the states.
DAVIS: Would you veto a national abortion ban if it came to --
TRUMP: Well, I won't have to because again -- two things. Number one, she said she'll go back to congress. She'll never get the vote. It's impossible for her to get the vote. Especially now with a 50-50 --essentially 50-50 in both senate and the house. She's not going to get the vote. She can't get the vote. She won't even come close to it. So it's just talk. You know what it reminds me of? When they said they're going to get student loans terminated and it ended up being a total catastrophe. The student loans -- and then her I think probably her boss, if you call him a boss, he spends all his time on the beach, but look, her boss went out and said we'll do it again, we'll do it a different way. He went out, got rejected again by the supreme court. So all these students got taunted with this whole thing about -- this whole idea. And how unfair that would have been. Part of the reason they lost. To the millions and millions of people that had to pay off their student loans. They didn't get it for free. But they were saying -- it's the same way that they talked about that, that they talk about abortion.
DAVIS: But if I could just get a yes or no. Because your running mate J.D. Vance has said that you would veto if it did come to your desk.
TRUMP: Well, I didn't discuss it with J.D. In all fairness. J.D. -- And I don't mind if he has a certain view but I think he was speaking for me but I really didn't. Look, we don't have to discuss it because she'd never be able to get it just like she couldn't get student loans. They couldn't get -- they didn't even come close to getting student loans. They didn't even come close to getting student loans. They taunted young people and a lot of other people that had loans. They can never get this approved. So it doesn't matter what she says about going to congress. Wonderful. Let's go to congress. Do it. But the fact is that for years they wanted to get it out of congress and out of the federal government and we did something that everybody said couldn't be done. And now you have a vote of the people on abortion.
DAVIS: Vice President Harris, I want to give you your time to respond. But I do want to ask, would you support any restrictions on a woman's right to an abortion?
HARRIS: I absolutely support reinstating the protections of Roe V. Wade. And as you rightly mentioned, nowhere in America is a woman carrying a pregnancy to term and asking for an abortion. That is not happening. It's insulting to the women of America. And understand what has been happening under Donald Trump's abortion bans. Couples who pray and dream of having a family are being denied IVF treatments. What is happening in our country, working people, working women who are working one or two jobs, who can barely afford childcare as it is, have to travel to another state to get on a plane sitting next to strangers, to go and get the health care she needs. Barely can afford to do it. And what you are putting her through is unconscionable. And the people of America have not -- the majority of Americans believe in a woman's right to make decisions about her own body. And that is why in every state where this issue has been on the ballot, in red and blue states both, the people of America have voted for freedom.
DAVIS: Vice president Harris --
TRUMP: Excuse me, I have to respond. Another lie. It's another lie. I have been a leader on IVF which is fertilization. The IVF -- I have been a leader. In fact, when they got a very negative decision on IVF from the Alabama courts, I saw the people of Alabama and the legislature two days later voted it in. I've been a leader on it. They know that and everybody else knows it. I have been a leader on fertilization, IVF. And the other thing, they -- you should ask, will she allow abortion in the eighth month, ninth month, seventh month?
HARRIS: Come on.
TRUMP: Would you do that? Why don't you ask her that question --
HARRIS: Why don't you answer the question would you veto –
TRUMP: That's the problem. Because under Roe v. Wade.
HARRIS: Answer the question, would you veto--
TRUMP: You could do abortions in the seventh month, the eighth month, the ninth month -
HARRIS: That's not true.
TRUMP: And probably after birth. Just look at the governor, former governor of Virginia. The governor of Virginia said we put the baby aside and then we determine what we want to do with the baby.
DAVIS: President Trump, thank you.
MUIR: We're going to turn now to immigration and border security. We know it's an issue that's important to Republicans, Democrats, voters across the board in this country. Vice President Harris, you were tasked by President Biden with getting to the root causes of migration from Central America. We know that illegal border crossings reached a record high in the Biden administration. This past June, President Biden imposed tough new asylum restrictions. We know the numbers since then have dropped significantly. But my question to you tonight is why did the administration wait until six months before the election to act and would you have done anything differently from President Biden on this?
HARRIS: So I'm the only person on this stage who has prosecuted transnational criminal organizations for the trafficking of guns, drugs, and human beings. And let me say that the United States Congress, including some of the most conservative members of the United States Senate, came up with a border security bill which I supported. And that bill would have put 1,500 more border agents on the border to help those folks who are working there right now over time trying to do their job. It would have allowed us to stem the flow of fentanyl coming into the United States. I know there are so many