Virtual tour offers insight into US presidential debates

AMMAN — The US presidential debates are a tradition that dates back to 1976, and there is no requirement that candidates should debate, but the importance lies in the performance of candidates, their image perception and the outcome of the elections, Professor at the Department of Communications at the University of Missouri Mitchell S. McKinney said last week.

McKinney delivered his remarks during a briefing presented as part of the “Elections 2020: A Virtual Reporting Tour of the United States and the American Electoral Process”, held and organised by the Foreign Press Centres (FPCs) at the US Department of State – Bureau of Global Public Affairs.

The briefing, held under the title “Role of the Debates”, was held before the first of four presidential debates between Donald Trump (Republican) and Joe Biden (Democrat), which was held on Tuesday.

McKinney said that often when candidates take the stage, there is greater civility between them; which was not the case in 2016 when Trump and Hillary Clinton (Democrat) were nominated.

In 2020, the first debate saw tension from the very beginning, amplified by the fact that candidates did not shake hands at the debate’s start, in spite of that being due to the health standards and measures related to the coronavirus pandemic.

The debate, sponsored by the Commission on Presidential Debates and moderated by Fox News Anchor Chris Wallace, who decided the topics and questions, saw big tension between the two candidates, as Trump kept cross-talking Biden throughout every session, while the latter asked the president to “shut up” and “quit yapping.”

The debate in Cleveland focused on matters of the Supreme Court, COVID-19, the economy, crime, civil unrest, healthcare, taxes, policing and race among other topics that are currently of big concern to Americans, especially in regard to COVID-19 and healthcare as more than 200,000 people died in the US from the virus, which Biden blamed on Trump during the debate as each candidate made their case on why they should be elected.

“I voted for Biden. I think it is always important to get out and vote as early as you can, I did it now because I have the time, I am working from home, just like most people are, and I think going to the polls is still fine, I am not worried about that or anything, but, you know, one nice thing about this area is that you have a lot of options, so I decided to do this,” Adam, from Arlington County, Virginia, told the Foreign Press Centre in an interview made available to The Jordan Times, conducted before the first debate.

When asked what issue is most important to him in the elections, Adam said, “just decency is what is most important to me”, noting that he is tired from the news cycle on lies and corruption, with “no one doing anything about it”.

Aditya Goyal, also from Arlington, said: “I voted for the Biden/Harris ticket,” noting that the issues most important to them is seeing “some change in how we deal with our immigration process, because I just think what the current administration is doing, is not very open… and I do feel that immigration issues do need to be better handled than they are being currently handled.”

“I decided to vote early, so that I get out of the way, as other people may not be able to necessarily come out and vote this early, and I am not taking up their time standing in line on election day,” Goyal said.

Alexi Bustill, who voted for Biden also, said that he voted for Joe because he believes there is “a lot of division and hatred coming directly from the White House, and that we are heading in the wrong direction.”

Bustill also said that he voted early because he travels for work and wanted to make sure his vote was counted; noting that he was concerned that if he used mail-in voting, his ballot might get lost in the mail, noting “I know that Arlington has a strong Democrat Party, but I just do not want to take any chances.”

In an interview with Bobby Stephens in Fairfax, Virginia, he said: “I am going to be voting for President Donald Trump in this election, and there is a number of reasons why, but I think really… in terms of what he has done, if you look at his record, he has accomplished more than any president in my lifetime in the three years he has been in office, three and half now, and he has been successful in delivering all of his campaign promises, and is the first politician I have seen to not go back on any of his campaign promises, which I think is really big.”

Stephens continued: “And also if you look at the record of Senator Joe Biden, you will see the record of somebody whose consistently inactive policies, that his supporters would call racist, and I would agree with them on that, and also, someone who is mentally and physically I do not think is capable of fulfilling the demands of the office, because he does not even seem to be able to get out of his basement to campaign.”

“So, debates have shown their ability to reach that very small slice of the undecideds, uncommitted, the ‘persuadables’. And of that group consistently 3 per cent to 4 per cent will come out of a viewing debates, again, 3 per cent or 4 per cent of 87 million claiming that they now have committed, they now know who they're going to vote for,” McKinney said during the briefing, noting that in this context, debates can be consequential in the outcome of the election in battle ground states.

There are different types of debates with different dynamics, McKinney said, noting how each of them provide different narratives about the candidates; however, with the recent announcement of Donald and Melania Trump being infected with coronavirus, the dynamics of the debates may shift further.