The first major event of the fall presidential campaign took place Sept. 10 with the presidential debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump — likely the only time these two candidates will debate before the election. Prior to the debate, The Cavalier Daily assembled an election focus group of undecided student voters to gauge their reactions throughout the election season. Now, just over a week after the debate, among the five participants present at the focus group’s first meeting, all five suggested Harris performed better than Trump in the debate, even if each candidates’ performance did not change their voting intention.
While Trump has been a very vocal candidate for the GOP, the debate, hosted by ABC News in Philadelphia, Pa., was the first chance for many voters to get to know Harris after her late entry into the presidential race. After the 90-minute debate that covered major issues like immigration, abortion, the economy and global conflicts, nationally, voters by-and-large thought Harris performed better than Trump — a CNN poll conducted immediately after the debate showed 63 percent thought Harris did better.
During this election, young voters — a typically low-turnout demographic — could play a key role in deciding the race at the margins, making their reactions especially important. The Cavalier Daily assembled a focus group of undecided student voters to help take the temperature of young undecided voters and understand which candidates they are leaning towards throughout the election season. All members were granted anonymity so that they could speak freely about their views and opinions.
After meeting for the first time just days after the debate, the five participants in attendance agreed that Harris had a better performance compared to Trump. While only one participant had their voting intention changed by the debate, from totally undecided to leaning toward Harris, another participant said Harris’s strong performance caused him to reconsider his preference, which was initially toward Trump.
Among the issues discussed during the debate, immigration was discussed more than other prominent issues, including the Israel-Hamas war, healthcare or the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, according to an analysis by the New York Times, which tracked the number of minutes spent on each topic.
Although Trump spent far more time attacking Harris on immigration than the other way around — four minutes and 34 seconds compared to just one minute and 12 seconds — the focus group participants said they were not as persuaded by Trump’s attacks because they saw them as indirect and missed opportunities to levy legitimate concerns with Harris’ positions.
Harris had the first chance to speak on immigration, responding to a question of how she would address the large influx of migrants at the United States-Mexico border. During her response, she accused Trump of worsening the crisis at the border by killing a bipartisan border security bill. She then quickly pivoted to criticize Trump’s campaign rallies, saying people leave his rallies early out of boredom. When Trump was given a chance to respond about immigration policy, he first fought back on the issue of rally attendance and crowd size.
One participant, a male Engineering student from Md., said Trump’s obsession with crowd size stuck out to him as a concern.
“Harris obviously threw [crowd size] in there on one of her issues where she was weakest to distract him, and it worked extremely well,” the student said. “Which just shows how childish and uncontrollable he is.”
Trump’s rhetoric was an issue raised by multiple participants. Phrases like “Trump is Trump” and “it’s hard to vote for Trump because of who he is” were used to describe his sometimes controversial statements when the participants were asked about their views of the candidates.
An example of this rhetoric came right after the crowd size remark, when Trump offered the false claim that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio are stealing pets from homes and eating them.
“In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs,” Trump said, prompting laughter from Harris. “The people that came in, they’re eating the cats.”
Immediately after that comment, Trump returned to the issue of crowd size.
One female College student from the Bay Area, Calif. listed immigration as the most important issue to her and said Trump missed opportunities to attack Harris on the topic of immigration — an issue for which she has been criticized. The student said she disliked the comment about Springfield because it was disparaging to immigrants.
“I think Trump had so much material and opportunity with [immigration],” she said. “Trump is his own worst enemy … to talk about immigrants as people that are just awful, dirty things, is not the way to approach it.”
That student added that Harris’s argument about Trump derailing the border security bill was convincing, calling Trump's handling of the bill “idiotic.”
The student said she is undecided in the race but has ruled out voting for Harris, saying her policies are too liberal. She also said that because she votes in California, a state Harris is likely to win, she is considering leaving the presidential ballot blank unless she begins to strongly favor Trump.
An issue discussed even more heavily at the debate than immigration was the issue of abortion. Abortion was thrust into the national landscape after the Supreme Court struck down the protections of Roe v. Wade in 2021, following Trump’s appointment of three conservative justices to the Court. The decision was particularly unpopular among women and young people — a Pew Research poll showed 62 and 69 percent of women and people aged 18-29 disapproved of the decision, respectively.
Harris spent more time attacking Trump on this issue, and one female College student from Northern Virginia, who stated abortion as her top issue, approved of Harris’s remarks.
“[Harris] made a lot of emotional appeals … she outlined different situations in which abortion is, in my opinion, necessary healthcare,” the student said. “I think she did a really great job of showcasing how she sees her voters as real individuals and not just numbers.”
During the debate, Trump took credit for overturning Roe v. Wade as he has in the past.
“For 52 years, they've been trying to get Roe v. Wade into the states. I did a great service in doing it. It took courage to do it, and the Supreme Court had great courage in doing it,” Trump said in the debate.
Harris, on the other hand, capitalized on the issue and cut debate remarks from both she and Trump into a new ad. The focus group viewed the ad, and almost all participants agreed that it was a strong ad, even if it did not change their mind personally.
One participant, a male fourth-year College student from N.C. who said he was planning on voting Trump before the debate and that his top issues were foreign policy and the economy, said that while he is pro-choice and agrees with Harris, he thought Trump explained his position well.
“This [ad] was forward focused, highlighting Kamala and her policies and her stance,” the student said. “I also thought Trump did a good job of explaining his reasoning behind his motivation to overturn Roe v. Wade and hand it off to the states.”
The student added that he appreciated that Harris focused more on her policy vision on the issue of abortion instead of solely attacking Trump, something he said she does in her other speeches and ads. The student still leans more toward Trump, but is less sure post-debate.
Another issue where Harris spent far more time on the attack than Trump did was Jan. 6 — Trump was on defense for the entire discussion, something that stuck out to multiple participants.
One participant, a male third-year College student from Md. who is still undecided about his vote but leans slightly toward Trump, said Trump took no accountability for Jan. 6 when he could have, something he believes moderates take issue with.
“We were founded on the principles of democracy, and January 6 goes against those principles to an absurd degree,” the student said. “He should have [said…he] will accept the results of the election, so that’s one of the biggest issues I have with how Trump did.”
While one other participant agreed that Jan. 6 is a big concern, two others said Trump’s actions on Jan. 6 do not bother them to the same degree.
A common theme from the participants was that — despite agreeing with the candidates on specific issues — the debate, by-and-large, did not change who they planned to vote for.
Content discussed in this focus group’s future meetings will be published on Election Day, Nov. 5, ahead of the election results.
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