New York Democrats reveled in Vice President Kamala Harris’ ability to put Republican former President Donald Trump on the defensive during their first, and likely only, presidential debate on Tuesday night.
Over the course of the roughly 90-minute debate, hosted by ABC News in Philadelphia, Harris successfully goaded Trump into going on angry, unhinged tangents instead of hitting her over President Biden’s record on the economy and immigration. Some of Trump’s worst moments saw him repeating false claims that newly arrived immigrants are eating people’s pets in Springfield, Ohio, and the debunked notion that some states allow for abortions after babies are born.
Harris also successfully got Trump to double-down on his 1989 demonization of the now-exonerated “Central Park Five” — a group of Black and Latino teenagers who were falsely convicted of raping and assaulting a woman in Central Park. One of the five individuals, Yusef Salaam, is now a City Council member and spoke to reporters on Harris’ behalf in the Spin Room after the debate.
During and after the debate, local Democrats cheered on Harris’ ability to draw a contrast between herself and the former president. They also mocked Trump for some of the more outlandish statements Harris drew out of him.
Gov. Kathy Hochul, who serves as a Harris campaign surrogate, said the debate demonstrated the “clear choice” between the vice president and Trump.
“Tonight, we heard more of Trump’s lies and saw the clear choice in this election,” Hochul wrote in a social media post. “A future of progress with @KamalaHarris or Trump’s extreme agenda to strip away rights and harm the middle class. We’re not going back.”
City Council Member Justin Brannan took to X to lampoon Trump for gloating about the number of people he fired as president, his false claims about migrants eating dogs and Democratic-run states allowing for post-natal abortions. He also made fun of Trump repeatedly invoking Viktor Orbán’s — the far-right prime minister of Hungary — praise of his presidency.
Orbán is one of many autocratic leaders who Trump often mentions having a good relationship with in an effort to show that he would be more effective in stifling global conflicts were he to be reelected as president.
“Guys (sic) one text from Trump to the dictator group chat and all the wars are over,” Brannan joked.
Meanwhile, it seemed as though local Republicans were left complaining about the referees.
They fumed over the ABC moderators’ — David Muir and Linsey Davis — fact-checking Trump but not Harris several times throughout the debate. The moderators chimed in to fact-check Trump at least three times, including on his false claims about migrants eating dogs and some states allowing post-birth abortions.
In reference to the moderators, Republican Brooklyn Council Member Inna Vernikov posted on X that there is “nothing even-handed about this. The bias is extremely obvious.”
US Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-Staten Island) insisted Trump had a strong performance despite what she described as a “skewed” debate.
“Trump doing very well & he is right on policy but this debate is skewed,” Malliotakis said. “He is debating three people….Kamala and the two biased @ABC moderators…and still winning!”
