The first presidential debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump will be held tonight at 9 p.m. ET in Philadelphia.
Gerard Filitti, a political strategist and senior counsel at The Lawfare Project, and Robin Biro, a senior Democratic strategist and former Obama regional campaign director, shared their views with NTD about the debate on various key issues.
‘A Different Debate’
Filitti expects a different debate compared to the one between President Joe Biden and Trump. This time Harris needs to lay out her policy, and Trump will confront her on it.
“We will have two candidates who are there to talk about their vision for the next four years,” he said. “Kamala Harris has a lot to live up to here, as she really needs to outline what she sees as her plans for the next four years, because a lot of Americans still have questions about her and want to know more about her and her policy ideas.”
Filitti added, “Donald Trump needs to find a way to address Kamala in a way that he’s not used to confronting her, perhaps on the issues and the substance of what she’s proposing while laying out his ideas, which is a different type of debate than we saw before.”
Biro predicted that the debate will center heavily on policy as Harris added policy details to her website just a day before the debate.
He said immigration reform could be another significant topic since both Republicans and Democrats are concerned about it. “It’s actually a No. 3 concern among Democrats as well,” he said.
Tipping Point?
Filitti said the debate will be pivotal.
Polling averages show a dead heat between Harris and Trump ahead of the debate.
“After the debate, we’re going to see a lot more voters who have made up their minds and are more determined and definitive on who they’re going to vote for,” he said.
NTD also asked voters if the debate would change their minds. Answers were a mix of hard-stuck support for one or the other candidate, open-mindedness, and decisions based on policy.
Wins for Harris and Trump
Biro said that for Harris to win, she would need to “land a few punches and hit back. If Trump tells anything untrue, she needs to call him on that.” He believed Harris would succeed “as long as she provides some clear opposition to his ideas.”
Filitti said Trump’s success lies in “coming across as presidential—someone who has a mastery of the facts and the details, a solid agenda,” and focusing on policy rather than “going after someone on a more personal level.”
Biro said Harris will lean toward being as moderate as possible.
“At this stage of the game, it’s about capturing undecided voters, the swing voters,” he said. “In 2020, we won with only 43,000 votes in just three states. It was such a narrow margin of electoral math. We’re facing that again, so she will definitely be trying to speak to those moderates.”
Filitti said Harris will probably not deviate from Biden’s policies, especially after she publicly supported Israel at the Democratic Convention.
“I expect her to stay consistent with Biden administration’s policy on Israel, ” he said. “And even though it may cost her votes in Michigan, I also think that those voters are not one-issue voters, that they will look at the Harris agenda in general and be guided by that.”
Biro noted that Harris has a “tightrope to walk.”
“She will be not saying anything controversial in the least, and I expect her to navigate that adeptly,” he said.
Topics Likely to Dominate Debate
Filitti expected Trump to focus on issues such as immigration, law and order, and foreign policy.
“He’ll likely argue that the Biden administration, and by extension a Harris presidency, would not be good for America on the foreign sphere,” he said.
He also believes the economy will be central to the debate.
“Everything comes back to money. Both candidates will be hopefully asked how they intend to pay for the initiatives that they’re putting forward,” he added.
Biro also said the economy will “absolutely” be front and center. As a father of two school-aged children, he said he loved some of Harris’s proposals, but he wants to know how she plans to pay for them.
Tiffany Meier and Sam Wang contributed to this report.