Author: Gyro Finance
The US election is getting increasingly tense, and the competition between Harris and Trump is getting more intense, whether in polls or betting markets. As of September 9, 2024, Harris leads Trump by 1.2 percentage points with a support rate of 48.4%. The PredictIt betting odds are even more stalemate, with Trump's chances of winning reversed again recently, with Harris leading at 52% and Harris at 51%, respectively.
Against this backdrop, Trump and Harris will hold their first public debate in Philadelphia, a historic city in Pennsylvania, an important swing state in the US election, at 9 p.m. local time on September 10. Their performance in their debut is likely to have a significant impact on the election.
The main governing views of the two parties, source: CICC Research
During the 90-minute debate, the two sides had a fierce confrontation on key issues such as abortion, immigration, tariffs and inflation, but it is worth noting that neither of them mentioned any information related to cryptocurrency.
The following is a summary of some of the views of both sides, with some deletions and modifications. The original video can be watched at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VgsC_aBquUE.
Inflation and Tariffs:
In terms of tariffs, the two hold different views. Harris opposes the imposition of large and comprehensive tariffs, believing that Trump unilaterally triggered a trade war. As for the views on internal taxation, Harris' overall advocacy remains consistent with the Biden administration, cutting taxes for middle- and low-income groups, but raising taxes on the rich and large companies, including raising capital gains taxes and taxing unrealized capital gains. Trump advocates continuing to promote large-scale tax cuts and further reducing the corporate income tax rate from the current 21% to 15%.
In this context, Harris called Trump's proposal to impose tariffs on overseas goods the "Trump sales tax," saying that it would ultimately be paid by middle-class American families. She took the opportunity to outline her plan to build an "opportunity economy," including proposals to make housing more affordable and expand child tax credits.
Trump continues his political advocacy, advocating a substantial tax increase. In his speech, Trump bluntly stated, " We are imposing tariffs, and in some cases they will be very strong." In response to Harris's sales tax statement, Trump responded, "First of all, I don't have a sales tax, which is not true." He then criticized Harris for the continued inflation during the Biden administration. During Biden's administration, the inflation rate peaked at 9.1% in June 2022, but he called this the worst period of inflation in the country's history, which obviously exaggerated the extent of price increases.
He also quickly turned to his top issue, immigration, claiming again, without evidence, that "millions of people from prisons, mental hospitals and lunatic asylums" were crossing the southern border with Mexico. He argued that inflation was "a disaster for the people, for the middle class, for every class."
Illegal immigration
Harris was the first to point out that due to Trump's lobbying of Republicans, the bipartisan immigration legislation was undermined in Congress. Trump accused Democrats of supporting "open borders," saying that immigrants were "occupying" American towns, that the actual number of illegal immigrants was "much higher" than the published data, and that "crime rates were rising." He also emphasized that the Biden administration's liberalization of immigration was simply to gain more votes, regardless of the interests of other citizens. However, the host cited data to question Trump's claim that crime rates were rising, as FBI data showed that all major crime categories fell by an average of 15% in the first quarter of 2024.
Trump then called the statistics "fraudulent," and Harris took the opportunity to mention the criminal charges facing Trump, saying, "I think this is very interesting for someone who has been prosecuted for national security crimes, economic crimes, and election interference."
Abortion rights
On the topic of abortion, which involves reproductive rights, Trump was fiercely attacked by Harris for his previous remarks banning abortion.
Harris said that "if Trump wins the election, he will sign a national abortion ban," and said that after the "Roe v. Wade" case was overturned, the Biden-Harris administration took a leading role in advocating for abortion rights. She assured people that once Congress passes a bill to restore the protection of Roe v. Wade, as the president of the United States, she will proudly sign it into law. As a candidate, she did not recognize the Hyde Amendment previously supported by Biden, which prevented federal funds from being used for most abortion procedures in the United States. Harris also further attacked Trump's abortion ban, saying that "Trump should not be dictating to women's bodies."
Trump's attitude has improved. He responded that he does not support banning abortion and mentioned that the Democratic Party is very radical in this regard, but he will not sign a national abortion ban. He is personally a leader in in vitro fertilization and said that Harris is making "lies" again. "This is a problem that divides our country," Trump said, and this problem should be returned to the states to solve.
Clean Energy
In terms of energy, Harris supports clean energy, while Trump's previous arguments were mostly advocating a return to traditional fossil energy. But in recent times, Trump has reversed in this direction. In his exchanges with Musk, he supported electric cars. In this debate, he once again accused Harris of "fossil fuels will die" if he was elected, and then said that he was a "super fan" of solar energy. On the other hand, Trump expressed his hope to repeal the Inflation Reduction Act that emphasizes the clean energy industry, recover unused funds, and promised to declare a national energy emergency after his election to increase U.S. oil and gas production and "achieve a substantial increase in domestic energy supply." It is worth noting that Trump has been satirizing the Democratic Party's energy and climate plans as a "green new scam" because according to data from the Clean Investment Monitor, in the first quarter of 2024, the United States continued to set record growth, with investments in clean energy and transportation reaching a new high of $71 billion.
When asked about climate change, Harris elaborated on how the Biden administration's climate agenda has become the pillar of the government's economic strategy, but did not provide too many details of her own policies. However, she has also changed her mind on this issue. She had previously stated in 2019 that she would ban hydraulic fracturing, but she mentioned this point again in this discussion, perhaps to gain the support of swing states. She will not ban hydraulic fracturing and will invest in various energy sources to reduce dependence on foreign oil. Hydraulic fracturing refers to pumping water, sand and chemicals into the ground to extract oil and natural gas from dense rock formations. Currently, most of the oil and natural gas production in the United States relies on hydraulic fracturing, but the process has been denied by environmental organizations that oppose fossil fuel production and worry about groundwater pollution.
Additionally, Harris touted her role as California Attorney General in suing oil companies, casting the deciding vote for the Inflation Reduction Act, and vowed to "tackle the climate crisis" while also lowering energy costs and ensuring energy security and independence.
Capitol Hill Events
The topic then turned to the Capitol Hill riots in January 2021. When Trump was asked if he regretted it, he said he had "nothing to do with it" except for giving a speech. He attributed the incident to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, saying that if she had done her job, the riots would not have happened. At the same time, Trump refused to admit that he lost the 2020 presidential election, saying that his remarks such as "lost by a hair's breadth" were ironic, and continued to reiterate his false claims of election fraud (Trump believes that the Democrats cheated in the election vote) .
Harris said, "We can't afford a president who will subvert the will of the voters," and she called on voters, "It's time to turn the page. Let's not go back to the old ways."
Interestingly, both mentioned supporting parties in their arguments, and analysts predict that the vote rate in this fall's election will be very close. In response, Harris said that she had the support of former Republican officials in the Trump administration, saying that everyone's choice was very wise. But Trump hit back, "This is normal, most of the people were fired by me." He also sarcastically said that the Biden-Harris administration is often criticized for "they never fire anyone."
Geopolitical conflict
In terms of geopolitical conflicts, Trump did not answer the host's question about whether he hoped Ukraine would win the war, but he said that ending the Russian-Ukrainian war and putting an end to it was in the best interests of the United States, and he said he would end the Russian-Ukrainian conflict before taking office as president . Trump specifically pointed out that if he were president now, Putin would be happier because he would not invade Ukraine and lose so many troops and resources.
Harris suggested that Trump would abandon Ukraine in exchange for Putin's support, "Putin will eat you for lunch." "If Donald Trump was elected president, Putin would be in Kiev now," Harris said, adding that she believes Trump and the Republicans would abandon Ukraine or make a deal with Putin to cede territory to Russia. She also mentioned that Russia would threaten Poland and linked the matter to Polish Americans in Pennsylvania.
When talking about the Palestinian-Israeli issue, Harris said she would defend Israel's right to self-defense, but at the same time she lost patience with the humanitarian problems caused by the Israeli Netanyahu government in Gaza. "This war must end immediately," Harris said when talking about the Gaza War. Trump continued to attack Harris, "She hates Israel. If Harris is elected president, Israel will no longer exist in two years," Trump said, "She also hates Arabs, and if I were president, all this (Gaza War) would not have started at all."
Harris refuted his claims, noting that she has supported Israel throughout her political career. "I will always give Israel the ability to defend itself," Harris said, while calling for an end to the war and a two-state solution that would provide security for the Israeli people "while also providing security for the Palestinians."
In addition to the above topics, the two expressed consensus on expanding the child tax credit program and both believed that a credit should be given for this purpose. They also discussed gun control bills, Obamacare, and China-US and China-India relations. Neither side expressed any different arguments from before.
Looking at the entire debate, we have to admit that perhaps because Trump did not have much contact with Harris before and did not know her well enough, Harris basically grasped the essence of irritating Trump and kept on talking about some topics, causing Trump to show emotions many times in his discussion. Harris was relatively stable, but her speech was also conservative as expected, and she did not have any outstanding performance. In terms of core political views, the two performed as usual. There was not much substantive discussion about policies in the debate. Neither candidate advocated economic policies that were very different from the current ones, and the differences in tariffs, immigration, and energy continued to intensify.
After the debate, there was no obvious gap between the two in public opinion, but both said they won overwhelmingly in the debate, and Trump even believed that "this was a 1 to 3 (Harris + 2 hosts' victory)". On the crypto prediction market Polymarket, Harris's chance of winning has risen to 49%.
