On Sept. 10, ABC hosted the second presidential debate of 2024 between Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris, with ABC News anchors David Muir and Linsey Davis as moderators. When the debate aired live from 6 p.m., Delta’s Politics and Law Club, as well as the Speech and Debate Club hosted a debate watch party at SCMA 161.
The watch party was open to all members of Delta across the political spectrum, with around 30 people attending. The event was overseen by political science professors Cirian Villavicencio and Joel Blank.
“I think this is the most pivotal election. I know it’s sort of cliché … but there’s something to be said about the current state of our politics and why this election is pivotal,” said Villavicencio. “Both our enemies, both foreign and domestic, are well positioned and we’re seeing it. The intelligence community has confirmed there is … interference in our elections. So it’s important for voters to be ever vigilant, to ensure that we have a free and fair election.”
The moderators raised several political issues throughout the debate, including but not limited to abortion, economic policy and foreign conflicts such as the Israel-Palestine conflict and Russia-Ukraine war. During the debate, Trump and Harris exchanged remarks on each other’s policies and personal attacks on each other’s character.
Harris is widely thought to have won the debate according to several news outlets and the public; an Ipsos poll conducted by ABC News from Sept. 11 to 13 revealed that 46 percent of people thought Harris won the debate, compared to 20 percent for Trump and 33 percent saying neither won or declining to answer. Opinions from the Delta watch party were mixed.
Refreshments such as pizza, chips and soda were provided at the watch party for Delta’s viewing pleasure. Throughout the debate, many Delta viewers laughed at Trump’s commentary, as well as Kamala’s rebuttals and the moderators’ fact-checking of Trump.
During the debate, when Kamala criticized Trump’s political rallies, Trump responded by comparing his rallies’ success to the failing state of the nation, attributing it to immigration. Trump went on to make comments based on claims promoted by Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance, which said that Haitian immigrants were abducting and eating people’s pets in Springfield, Ohio.
“In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs. The people that came in, they’re eating the cats. They’re eating … the pets of the people that live there,” said Trump.
The audience in the Delta watch party reacted with laughter to Trump’s comment and the moderators’ fact-checking of him. Trump’s comment went on to become a viral meme across social media, spread by posters throughout the political spectrum. The meme has seen frequent use as propaganda to demerit either candidate, with AI-generated images posted by the official Twitter account of the House Judiciary Committee’s republican leadership and Trump’s Truth Social account playing into the pet-eating meme.
The claims of immigrants eating pets in Springfield have caused a wave of anti-immigrant hate centered in Springfield. Multiple facilities across Springfield have received bomb threats citing the pet-eating meme since the debate.
“I cannot believe anyone would take that statement seriously. I would say it’s xenophobic obviously, but it’s also just cruel. It’s incredibly cruel,” said Layla Alaswad, vice president of the Politics and Law Club and of Associate Students of Delta College.
When the debate ended, Villavicencio and Blank gave political science analysis on Trump and Harris’s performance and allowed event-goers to share their thoughts to the room.
“I told my class the other day: let’s not look at a debate like a sporting event. ‘Someone won, someone lost.’ Or let’s not look at it as a film class. ‘They did a great performance, they were emotional, they were connective,’ you know. I don’t think those individuals were looking at that debate from those perspectives, we’re looking at ‘what candidate’s speaking to us, what candidate’s speaking to my concerns.’ I think in that sense, that debate was very clarifying,” said Blank.
Trump has rejected the idea of a third presidential debate, while the Harris campaign said that Harris was open to debating Trump a second time. Vance is scheduled to debate Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Walz on Oct. 1.
