Vice President Kamala Harris seems to have emerged as the winner of the first presidential debate between her and Republican candidate Donald Trump, and veteran pollster Nate Silver offered his take on the proceedings on Wednesday.
Pointers To Harris Win: The strong consensus is that Harris won the night, said Silver, who founded FiveThirtyEight but is no longer associated with the polling analytics website. In a new post on his substack named Silver Bulletin, the polling veteran said Polymarket predicted that there is a 99% chance that Harris would be judged the winner of the debate.
Polymarket bets also show that Harris has broken even with Trump after trailing him in the betting market odds. He noted that the probability of winning for each candidate was 49%. The decline in Bitcoin BTC/USD following the debate also signals that Trump has lost. From a pre-debate peak of $57.7K, the apex crypto has fallen to $56.5K.
Trump has been relatively more pro-crypto vis-a-vis Harris, who has yet to spell out her stance ever since she entered the fray.
Silver said even the pro-Trump media outlet Fox News’ panel conceded that his rival was the debate’s winner and CNN’s flash poll regarding who won the debate returned results in favor of the vice president.
Harris Better Tactician: Silver said Harris is a good tactician as she repeatedly threw the bait and her rival took it every time. Delving into how Trump performed, the polling veteran said Trump didn’t seem to know what to do with the long two-minute blocks and the microphones muted. “You'll probably see some process stories complaining that Trump wasn't well prepared for the evening,” he said.
He also said the former president was speaking as if he were addressing one of his campaign rallies, using coded terminology that is known only to the Republican base.
Biased Moderation? Making sense of the Republicans’ complaint of the moderation being biased, Silver said it was a bearish indicator for Trump. He, however, said the set of questions was friendly to Harris, with ABC News’ real-time fact-checking playing out well for her.
Election Issues: The economy was Trump’s strong point versus other topics, as he stuck to simple rhetoric rather than things such as tariffs which an economist may not approve of, Silver said.
The first 10 minutes focused on the economy was good for Trump but fatigue set in thereafter and he couldn’t bring his “A-game,” Silver said.
Then the momentum shifted as the sustained debate on abolition early in the evening was very bullish for Harris, he said, as it proved to be the Democrats’ ‘best single topic.’ Trump couldn’t explain that the Supreme Court’s stance of leaving abortion to the discretion of the states was a good thing, he said.
Trump’s failure to detail the “concepts of a plan” he has for Obamacare also ended up a positive for Harris, he added.
Silver noted that Harris repeatedly tried to recycle themes from her convention speech such as the American competitiveness against China and the military having a “lethal” fighting force. But these themes did not get her a sustained convention bounce, he said.
The former president came off more like the incumbent, which is bullish for his rival, Silver said. Despite some effective moments like in the closing statement in which he asked what she had been doing for the past three-and-a-half years, he could not build these to a “crescendo,” he said.
A Second Debate? If Harris gains in the polls following Tuesday’s debate, the two candidates would have an incentive to debate again, Silver said, adding that the race has now become neck-on-neck.
“Harris got the debate she wanted. If she isn't able to move the needle in the polls at least a little bit, maybe that means the country just isn't buying what she's selling,” said Silver.
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