- Harris made the comment in her first response of the debate.
- The moderator asked Trump about falsely claiming he had won.
A violent confrontation over January 6 proved to be one of the key moments of the debate after a question and interjections from moderator David Muir.
Vice President Kamala Harris said early in the debate that Trump “left us with the worst attack on our democracy since the Civil War,” and the topic came up again when Muir mentioned it later.
“I had nothing to do with it other than I was asked to make a speech,” Trump said. He mentioned the shooting of Ashli Babbitt outside the House of Representatives on January 6 and said that “nobody died on the other side.”
Harris, whose campaign has sought to reframe President Biden’s emphasis on calling Trump a threat to democracy as part of her own revamped campaign, said Trump “incited a violent mob to attack our nation’s Capitol.”
Harris said Trump was “impeached and impeached for exactly that reason,” and then moved on to her campaign message: “We don’t have to go back. We’re not going backwards. We’re not going backwards. It’s time to move on.”
She herself made some digs into the past, pointing to Trump’s statement at a 2020 debate when he was asked a question about the Proud Boys, and reciting a statement about Charlottesville was a cornerstone of Biden’s 2020 campaign.
Former President Donald Trump repeated his claims about winning the 2020 election
She used the question to appeal to Trump’s critics, after initially singling out members of the military who have broken with Trump. “There is a place in our campaign for you. To defend the country, to defend our democracy, to defend the rule of law.”
Trump maintained his stance that he won the election after ABC News anchor Muir told him he “falsely claimed he won,” in a furious exchange that came before each candidate traveled to New York and Pennsylvania to mark the anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.
“They said we didn’t have legitimacy. A technicality,” Trump said of the court cases that ruled against him during his attempt to overturn the election.
He also responded when Muir mentioned his recent statement that he “lost by a hair,” an apparent admission that he did lose.
“He said that sarcastically,” Trump said, days after telling podcaster Lex Fridman: “I got millions more votes than that and I lost by a hair.”
On Tuesday, during the prime-time debate, Trump said he had gotten “almost 75 million votes,” rounding up to 74 million, “the most votes any sitting president has ever gotten.”
Vice President Kamala Harris said “Donald Trump was fired by 81 million people” and said she was having a hard time processing it.
“Donald Trump was fired by 81 million people. Let’s be clear about this: it’s clear that he’s having a hard time processing it,” he said.
Trump repeatedly tried to spin the issue of immigration and blame the influx of undocumented immigrants on Harris.
“What about all the people coming into our country and killing people that she allowed in? She was the border czar. Remember that? She was the border czar. She doesn’t want to be called the border czar because the border embarrasses her,” he said.
“When are they going to prosecute those people? When are they going to prosecute the people who burned down Minneapolis or Seattle? They came into Seattle and took over a large percentage of the city of Seattle. When are they going to prosecute those people?” he asked.