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Who won the presidential debate is in the eye of the beholder as Trump and Biden argue, giving little of substance to voters and both claiming victory.
USA TODAY
The first 2020 presidential debate between President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden brought a lot of shouting, tense exchanges and insults. Amid that, their answers to moderator Chris Wallace’s questions included some truths, misleading statements and flat out falsehoods.
Here’s a look at some of the flashpoints.
When coronavirus came up, Biden accused Trump of not having a plan. Trump noted even Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease specialist, had said his approach had saved thousands of lives.
That is true. On July 31, Fauci told a House panel that Trump’s actions early in the pandemic, like travel restrictions, did save lives. But many other experts have faulted Trump for his administration’s failure to develop a national testing strategy and for the president’s mixed messages on the virus’ severity.
Trump also pointed out that Democratic governors had praised his response, saying he’d done a “phenomenal job.” While they may not have used those exact words, it is true that governors, including New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, thanked the White House early in the pandemic for being responsive.
The president then criticized the Obama administration’s handling of the swine flu.
“Well, you didn’t do very well in swine flu. H1N1, you were a disaster,” Trump said.
But that is not a fair comparison.
The 2009 swine flu pandemic infected an estimated 60.8 million people in its first year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, versus about 5 million COVID-19 cases confirmed in the U.S. And the H1N1 pandemic in 2009 caused a stir, even shutting down some schools. However, the comparison lacks important context about the severity of each virus. While the swine flu spread easily, the virus had only a fraction of the fatality rate of COVID-19.
Biden pointed out the president encouraged people to ingest bleach. Trump claimed he made that remark as a joke.
Amid the COVID-19 portion of the debate, the use of masks came up. Trump pointed out that Fauci at first said masks were no good, then changed his mind.
This is partially true. Early in the pandemic, Fauci and other public health officials discouraged the use of masks, saying they should be reserved for health workers.
By April, the CDC changed its guidance, recommending that Americans wear at least cloth masks when in public.
Fauci has said his initial recommendation was based on the scientific understanding of the virus at that time and concerns about a shortage of personal protective equipment for those on the front lines.
“We were told in our task force meetings that we have a serious problem with the lack of PPEs and masks for the health providers who are putting themselves in harm’s way every day to take care of sick people,” Fauci said in a July interview. “When it became clear that the infection could be spread by asymptomatic carriers who don’t know they’re infected, that made it very clear that we had to strongly recommend masks.”
President Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden argue what to do about COVID-19 and the pandemic at the first 2020 presidential debate.
USA TODAY
More: How the CDC failed public health officials fighting the coronavirus
On campaign rallies
Biden and Trump argued over campaign rallies, with Biden hitting the president over holding large events during the pandemic. Trump said his rallies have had no adverse effects.
“We’ve had no negative effect, and we’ve had 35, 40,000 people at these rallies.”
That is not true.
His first campaign rally after the pandemic started was in June in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Tulsa’s top health official said that event was “likely” a contributing factor in an ensuing surge of cases in the city. Former GOP candidate Herman Cain attended that rally and later died of coronavirus.
As for crowd size at Trump’s events, the president’s assertion isn’t even close. The Tulsa event had just over 6,000 people. Events since then have had an average attendance of 7,000-9,000 people.
President Donald Trump, center, walk toward the stage while supporters cheer during his campaign rally at BOK Center in Tulsa, Okla., Saturday, June 20, 2020. (Photo: Ian Maule/Tulsa World via AP)
Trump alleged the former vice president couldn’t get a crowd at his rallies. In fact, Biden’s campaign has kept events intentionally small to prevent infections.
More: Trump rallies 2.0: Behind the curtain at the president’s campaign events in the COVID-19 era
Did Biden describe the military as ‘stupid bastards’?
This is misleading. In a 2016 visit to an air base near Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, Lt. Karen Johnson – a native of Wilmington, Delaware – introduced Biden to the rest of the troops, per a video from The Washington Examiner.
“Notwithstanding what you may hear about me, I have incredibly good judgment,” Biden remarks in the video. “One, I married Jill. And two, I appointed Johnson to the academy, I just want you to know that.”
Following that remark, expecting applause, Biden encouraged the troops to clap for Johnson in part by calling them “stupid bastards.” Once they began to applaud, he continued, “Man, you are a dull bunch. Must be slow here, man.”
More: Fact check: Joe Biden called troops ‘stupid bastards,’ but only ‘jokingly’
Andrew Bates, a spokesman for his campaign, said it was a joke.
“Vice President Biden was jokingly encouraging the audience to clap for an airwoman on the stage, and a number of service members can be seen laughing and smiling at the comment. Seconds before, he praised them for ‘the incredible sacrifices (they) make for our country,’” Bates told The Daily Beast.
Where did Biden go to college?
Trump claimed that Biden has misstated where he went to college, claiming Biden said he went to Delaware State University, the state’s only historically Black college.
This past week, conservative media outlets reported that Biden falsely said he attended Delaware State. These reports are incorrect. This statement made by Biden was taken out of context.
More: No, Joe Biden did not say he attended Delaware State University
Biden said he got his “start” at DSU during a town hall in Florence, South Carolina, ahead of the 2019 primaries. The video clip has been circulating the internet, after a reporter from the Washington Times asked DSU officials if Biden ever attended the school.
In the video, the former vice president was not implying that he attended the university, but rather referring to the support he received from the school when he announced his bid for U.S. Senate on the DSU campus in 1972, university spokesman Carlos Holmes said.
On crime
Law and order was a contentious subject at the debate, with the two candidates sparing over who can best keep Americans safe at a time of national reckoning over police violence against African Americans.
“Law and order with justice where people get treated fairly,” Biden said. “And the fact of the matter is violent crime went down 17%, 15% percent in our administration. It’s gone up on his watch.”
More: Donald Trump sidesteps call to condemn white supremacists — and the Proud Boys were ‘extremely excited’ about it
The Detroit Free-Press found the statistic to be accurate, though only relating to the rate of change in violent crime; the total number of crimes was about 10% lower than when Obama took office.
Meanwhile, when Trump was pressed by Wallace on why homicides spiked this year’s summer, Trump claimed “53 people were shot and 8 died” and claimed that crime in New York City was up by as much as 200%.
The president was accurately referencing a Sept. 8 shooting in Chicago that killed eight people. Statistics from the New York Police Department also show that shooting incidents increased in the city by 177% in July compared to last year, though other forms of crime were down.
Trump’s claim that violent crime is only rising in Democratic cities, however, is a stretch. Violent crime has risen in both Republican and Democratically-led cities, according to FBI data and other independent research.
More: Who won the presidential debate? Not voters with arguments, attacks, and little substance
On election integrity
The safety of voting by mail was the topic of the final segment of the debate. Trump declared ballots to be “a disaster,” claiming “solicited” ballots — presumably those requested by a voter, often called absentee ballots — are OK. “You’re soliciting. You’re asking. They send it back. You send it back. I did that.” He followed up with the assertion that other types of mail-in ballots are fraudulent. He said in some areas, “everybody got two ballots.”
This is false.
More: Fact check: What’s true and what’s false about voting by mail in 2020
Though it is common for multiple ballot request applications to be sent out ahead of the election, requesting more than one vote-by-mail ballot and submitting more than one ballot is illegal.
All mailed ballots must be verified to be counted — whether or not they are absentee or mail-in ballots. The only difference between the terms is the process. Voters have to request absentee ballots, while voters states with universal mail-in systems do not require registered voters to request ballots. Officials just send them automatically.
More: 2020 presidential voter’s guide to absentee voting
Several states have voted entirely by mail for as many as 20 years with fraud cases being an extreme rarity, and states have protections in place to ward against election fraud.
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