Many political pundits are saying that Vice President Kamala Harris was the clear winner of this week’s presidential debate, as she “baited” GOP nominee Donald Trump into going off on rants and not staying on point.
One GOP strategist said on Tuesday that Trump set that up for her in advance of the actual debate itself.
Speaking to Fox News on Tuesday, Karl Rove said that Trump erred by “lowering the bar” for Harris as the debate was approaching. As he told anchor Bret Baier:
“I think it was a mistake for Trump to basically diminish her, calling her stupid and lowering the bar for her because expectations matter a lot in these kinds of things.”
The debate took place in Philadelphia, and was the first between Trump and his new Democratic opponent. Trump squared off with President Joe Biden in the now-infamous first presidential debate back in June.
The president performed so poorly at that debate that he was finally convinced by Democratic leaders to drop out of the race, paving the way for his vice president to take his spot atop the ticket.
As of now, there isn’t another debate scheduled between Trump and Harris, though there are discussions for a future one that could be held on Fox News.
Since Harris became the Democratic leader in July, Trump has had to shift gears in his campaign. He came up with one of his famous nicknames for her right away, calling her “Comrade Kamala.”
Those types of antics, though, are not going to do Trump any good, as Rove insinuated, especially in a race that’s projected to be very close.
Rove’s Fox News appearance happened before the debate took place, but he did seemingly have an accurate prediction. He said that he thought whichever candidate left the debate looking “more presidential” will “have an advantage in the aftermath of this.”
Polls before the debate were pretty even, and while new polls haven’t been released just yet, some people believe that Harris may have successfully gained some ground with her performance.
Rove himself said he believes that this race will get even closer as November draws nearer. He did say, though, that the debate probably won’t have a huge effect on the outcome of polls.
A large majority of the voters have already decided who they’re going to vote for on Election Day, Rove said, but he added that a “little movement matters a lot when you have a race as tight as this one.”
Ultimately, it seems that this election is going to come down to only a few states who will decide the outcome. As he pointed out:
“We’re going to be [on] an endless tour from Nevada to Arizona to Georgia to North Carolina to Pennsylvania … Wisconsin and Michigan.”
The goal for both candidates now has to be attracting undecided voters to their side and also convincing people who might otherwise not vote at all to take action and vote for them.
