By a two-to-one margin, voters who watched Thursday night’s debate say Donald Trump outperformed Joe Biden, according to a CNN flash poll.
Strong Debate Performance
The poll reveals that 67 percent of debate watchers believe Trump delivered a better performance, compared to 33 percent for Biden. This result exceeds pre-debate expectations, where 55 percent of voters anticipated Trump would outperform Biden, versus 45 percent who expected Biden to excel.
Polling Methodology and Demographics
The poll was conducted via text message among 565 registered voters who watched the debate. It’s important to note that this sample represents debate watchers specifically, not the overall electorate, and may not reflect broader public opinion. CNN indicates that the respondents were slightly more Republican than the general U.S. population.
Biden’s Struggles Highlighted
All Joe Biden needed to do was deliver a repeat performance of his State of the Union address. Instead, he stammered. He stumbled. And, with fewer than five months to November, he played straight into Democrats’ worst fears — that he’s fumbling away this election to Donald Trump.
Alarm Bells for Democrats
The alarm bells for Democrats started ringing the second Biden started speaking in a haltingly hoarse voice. Minutes into the debate, he struggled to mount an effective defense of the economy on his watch and flubbed the description of key health initiatives he’s made central to his reelection bid, saying “we finally beat Medicare” and incorrectly stating how much his administration lowered the price of insulin. He talked himself into a corner on Afghanistan, bringing up his administration’s botched withdrawal unprompted. He repeatedly mixed up “billion” and “million,” and found himself stuck for long stretches of the 90-minute debate playing defense.
When he wasn’t speaking, he stood frozen behind his podium, mouth agape, his eyes wide and unblinking for long stretches of time.
“There’s still time,” Van Jones said, suggesting Biden should be replaced.
“Biden is toast — calling it now,” said Jay Surdukowski, an attorney and Democratic activist from New Hampshire who co-chaired former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley’s 2016 presidential campaign in the state.
In text messages with POLITICO, Democrats expressed confusion and concern as they watched the first minutes of the event. One former Biden White House and campaign aide called it “terrible,” adding that they have had to ask themselves over and over: “What did he just say? This is crazy.”
Defensive Strategies and Missed Opportunities
Biden’s team was quick to defend the president’s performance. First, they said he had a cold (and that he was negative for Covid-19). Then they insisted Trump was hurting himself by insulting Biden’s presidential record.
Biden did grow stronger throughout the night, at one point seizing on Trump’s reported dismissal of fallen soldiers as “suckers and losers” to skewer the former president as the real “sucker” and “loser.” At others, he hammered Trump’s criminal conviction in New York. “The only person on this stage who’s a convicted felon is the man I’m looking at right now,” Biden said.
Mixed Reactions Among Democrats
But first impressions matter — particularly to voters just tuning into the election and who were more likely to watch the first debate than the second that’s scheduled for September. And instead of setting the tone of the next phase of the presidential campaign, Biden’s shaky performance reignited fears among Democrats that the octogenarian whose mental acuity and physical fitness have stood as voters’ chief concerns about returning him to the White House might not even be able to carry the party through to November.
“Time for an open convention,” one prominent operative texted.
Biden’s team had tried to engineer the debate in his favor — pushing for it to be early and without an audience. And the president agreed to hold the event in part to calm Democratic nerves over whether he could win in November.
Afterward, they didn’t try to cover up his poor performance but instead tried to emphasize that Trump remained a threat to American interests at home and abroad.
“It was a slow start, that’s obvious to everyone. I’m not going to debate that point,” Vice President Kamala Harris told CNN’s Anderson Cooper an hour after the debate wrapped. “I’m talking about the choice in November. I’m talking about one of the most important elections in our collective lifetime. And do we want to look at what November will bring and go on a course for America that is about a destruction of democracy?”
While some Democrats were quick to brush aside Biden’s blunders — Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.) said Biden “isn’t a TV showman, he’s a workhorse” — the trajectory of the race appears dramatically changed.
“My job right now is to be really honest. Joe Biden had one thing he had to do tonight. And he didn’t do it,” former Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) told MSNBC. “He had one thing he had to accomplish. And that was to reassure America that he was up to the job at his age. And he failed at that tonight.”
Already, some Democrats were openly saying that Biden should end his campaign. One major Democratic donor and Biden supporter said simply: “Biden needs to drop out. No question about it.”
Key Takeaways
- Debate Performance: Trump outperformed Biden with 67 percent of viewers favoring his performance.
- Biden’s Struggles: Biden stumbled through his responses, reigniting concerns about his fitness for office.
- Democratic Concerns: Many Democrats are worried about Biden’s ability to carry the party through to November, with some calling for him to drop out.
- Polling Demographics: The poll reflects the views of debate watchers, a group slightly more Republican than the overall electorate.
This strong showing for Trump in the first debate sets a critical tone for the campaign ahead, indicating that the debates will be a major battleground for both candidates.
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