27 lines explaining the presidential debate between Trump and Harris

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Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump faced off on facts, dueling over policy issues and trading barbs in Tuesday's presidential debate hosted by ABC News, including Trump bringing up the idea of ​​immigrants eating pets.

Here are 27 quotes to understand what happened during their showdown in Philadelphia.

These quotes don't cover some of the moments on both sides where detailed factual claims were made, but CNN's fact check provides good context for this.

This statement comes midway through the debate, but it is perhaps the most important, because this debate was in every way different from the one between Trump and President Joe Biden in June, which ultimately ended Biden's re-election campaign. This one gave Harris the opportunity to laugh at Trump, tell him he's weak and annoy him in a variety of ways.

Harris has repeatedly accused Trump of lying, saying she has lied about his positions, including Project 2025, the conservative policy plan of his allies, which he said he has not read.

He is talking about Harris' plan for an “economy of opportunity,” but this insult-filled sentence also expresses Trump's motto for the evening: to link Harris with Biden and also to make her appear too willing to change her policy proposals.

Another example came up during a discussion about tariffs. The Biden administration maintained some of the tariffs imposed by Trump on China, but Harris opposes Trump's plan to impose new tariffs on all foreign goods.

Later, during a heated exchange on abortion, Trump repeated the false claim that Democrats wanted to allow abortions in the ninth month of pregnancy. The following was part of Harris' response:

Harris also argued regarding abortion rights and abortion freedom:

Trump tried to argue that by appointing “genius” Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe v. Wade, he had united the country and given the states their vote back – where voters, when given the chance, overwhelmingly supported abortion rights.

Of course, many other states have severe restrictions on abortion rights. The fact that states have such different laws suggests that the country is not as united as he said.

In another exchange, Trump attempted to point to the influx of illegal immigrants by repeating an apparently false story about migrants eating dogs and cats in an Ohio town. Trump's running mate, Senator JD Vance of Ohio, has acknowledged that this is probably not true. In her response, Harris said:

She added that many former Trump aides and people who served in his administration had also warned that he should return to the White House.

Trump complained that many of his former employees who are now against him – including former Defense Secretary Mark Esper – have since written books about their experiences.

Harris was asked if she took responsibility for the chaotic US withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021 and the deaths of 13 US soldiers at Abbey Gate outside Kabul airport. Instead, she defended the decision to withdraw:

Trump acknowledged that his administration had negotiated with the Taliban to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan, but he said he would have done things differently than Biden after Trump reached an agreement with the Taliban.

Harris mocked Trump's foreign policy and repeatedly called him “weak.” After Trump claimed that Harris hated both Israel and the Palestinians, she said the following:

She added:

Trump then praised Viktor Orban, the autocrat at the head of Hungary, whom he hosted at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.

The fear he instilled among world leaders made the world a safer place during his presidency, Trump said.

In another exchange, Harris invited people to a Trump rally in an obvious attempt to provoke him:

Trump strongly disagreed:

Trump also repeatedly said Harris would end fracking in Pennsylvania and take away people's guns. She herself repeatedly said no, she would not end fracking, arguing the U.S. can both fracking and fight climate change, which is sure to anger environmentalists.

And on guns, she interrupted her own response to Obamacare to say:

The issue that Trump kept coming back to was immigration and his theory – for which there is no evidence whatsoever – that the Democrats were intentionally bringing migrants to the United States.

Trump said immigrants were the reason for the rise in crime. When one of the debate moderators pointed to FBI data showing that violent crime is declining overall, Trump said the data was wrong. Moments later, Harris responded with this:

Trump's legal problems do not suggest he respects the rule of law, she said. Trump argued that the justice system has been used as a weapon against him.

This was a reference to the Russia investigation from Trump's time in the White House, which seems so long ago.

Harris argued several times that it was time to “turn over a new leaf” and bring in a new generation and a president who would build people up instead of insulting and tearing them down. But she didn't shy away from slipping an insult into a point about homeownership:

Trump is also proud of his past:

Regardless, Trump said he still does not accept his 2020 election loss and that despite all the evidence and all his failures in court to challenge the results, he still believes there is evidence of election fraud. While he does not understand why the people who stormed the Capitol on January 6, 2021, have been targeted by prosecutors, he also does not feel he had anything to do with the insurrection:

Trump was also asked about his recent comments that Harris “accidentally turned black” several years ago. One of the debate moderators asked if Trump thought it was appropriate to comment on his opponent's ethnic identity.

Harris, on the other hand, said Trump has tried to divide the country along racial lines in the past. She pointed out that he supported executing the Central Park Five – black and Latino boys falsely accused of rape in the late 1980s – and that he questioned the citizenship of former President Barack Obama.

Trump is adamant that there is voter fraud, despite there being no evidence of a widespread conspiracy. He repeatedly points out that he received the votes of nearly 75 million people in 2020, suggesting that it is not possible that he lost.

Harris later returned to the 2020 election and said the votes for Trump were not enough.

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