Despite debate disaster, Trump says he won

Ex-president, Trump, after the debate doesn't really look like he has convinced himself that he actually won a debate almost everyone says he lost. | Matt Rourke/AP

Despite overwhelming majorities of voters saying the debate Tuesday was a victory for Kamala Harris, in his usual routine of repeating lies until they are believed, he claimed that he was the winner of the debate.

The now-known criminal and serial liar attempting to re-enter the White House told at least 33 lies during the debate while he, a criminal himself, condemned millions of hard-working, law-abiding legal residents as criminals who have invaded the country. Kamala Harris attacked as “really rich” the idea that the convicted felon running for president would, as he awaits sentencing, be calling law-abiding residents criminals.

The list of lies he told Tuesday included doubling down on his claim that he won the 2020 election which, in fact, he lost by almost 8 million votes.

Another lie was his claim that he “had nothing to do” with the marauding crowd of his violent supporters who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, resulting in hundreds of injured cops and six deaths as they tried to prevent the congressional certification of the Biden election win and keep Trump in office illegally.

He claimed that in Springfield, Ohio, “they’re eating dogs. The people that came in (legally documented immigrant workers hired in the town), they’re eating the cats. They’re eating the pets of the people that live there.” The debate moderator had to cut in and note that local law enforcement had debunked those claims which originated as un-substantiated conspiracy theories on social media.

Another claim was that a young boy was murdered by “an illegal immigrant.” The boy’s father went on national television to point out that this was another Trump lie and that his son had, in fact, died in a car accident.

He claimed that Kamala Harris had “switched” from being Asian-American (Indian) to being Black for political purposes. Harris has always identified as being both. She said that her mother, who came from India, was always well aware that she had two Black daughters. Her father was from Jamaica.

Trump claimed that “we have inflation like very few have ever seen before, probably in the entire history of the United States.” The inflation rate was higher in the 1970s and early 1980s. The rate is down now but prices remain high not because of supply chain issues causing inflation but because of corporate collusion around price gouging, something Trump never mentions. Harris has promised to fight price gouging by big corporations.

Trump lied about crime, saying “crime here is through the roof.”

In fact, violent crime has dropped to the lowest level in decades. It was much higher in 2020 when Trump was president. And it has dropped 15 percent in the first quarter of this year alone. The biggest drops in crime have been in cities with more than a million people. Chicago has long been thought of as the crime capital of the country, at least in the public perception. Yet, as the city filled with visitors for the recent Democratic National Convention, there was relative peace all over town.

In any case, Trump has never supported the types of things that result in lower crime including good schools, good job opportunities, increased income, better healthcare, and good social programs in general.

Trump said that Democrats support abortion in the ninth month of pregnancy and even after the baby is born. That of course would be infanticide, something that does not happen legally anywhere in the United States. Deaths related to pregnancy do happen but they happen because of denial of medical care to pregnant women resulting from Trump-backed bans on abortion rights and women’s health care in general.

He claimed that he has been found innocent of charges against him in the many court cases he faces for having broken all kinds of laws. Only in the stolen documents case in Florida has a judge, for now, thrown the case out of court. The judge is one of the cronies he appointed. All the other cases, including ones in which he has been found guilty and is awaiting sentencing, remain standing. Those include the case around his having tried to stage a coup in January 2021.

He said Democrats are registering “illegal aliens” to vote. There have been no documented cases of that happening anywhere in the country.

He said he “saved” the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare). That is a lie. He tried 60 times to kill it and replace it with nothing. It was saved by Democrats in the Senate along with a deciding vote cast by then-Republican Sen. John McCain who left what would become his deathbed to save it from the Trump-backed onslaught.

He denied saying he predicted a “bloodbath” if he loses the election in November. That too was a lie. His exact words were: “Now, if I don’t get elected it’s going to be a bloodbath. A bloodbath for the country.”

He also lied when he said “everyone” wanted to end Roe and sent it back to the states. Harris said that women bleeding out in parking lots because emergency room doctors are not treating them are certainly not among those who wanted it “returned to the states.” In fact, whenever it comes up for a vote, the voters have turned down state plans to take away abortion care rights.

These are just a few of the major lies told by Trump on Tuesday night. They are all about Trump and what he wants. They are often about his grievances over past injustices allegedly suffered by him. Unlike Harris, he never laid out proposals or raised issues that would make life better for the people of America. The lies he told helped make it so much easier for Kamala Harris to make the point that her campaign and her plans are about the future while his thing is dwelling upon a past the people want to finally move away from.

It is now necessary for all the parts of the massive anti-MAGA majority to campaign and then turn out to vote on Election Day not just for Kamala Harris but for all the people who can sweep the MAGA Republicans out of their seats in the House, the Senate, and in state and local legislative bodies.

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CONTRIBUTOR

John Wojcik

John Wojcik is Editor-in-Chief of People's World. He joined the staff as Labor Editor in May 2007 after working as a union meat cutter in northern New Jersey. There, he served as a shop steward and a member of a UFCW contract negotiating committee. In the 1970s and '80s, he was a political action reporter for the Daily World, this newspaper's predecessor, and was active in electoral politics in Brooklyn, New York.