Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton won the third debate in a row. It took place at the University of Nevada early on October 20 Kyiv time. According to the CNN’s survey, 52 percent of the audience handed the victory to her, while only 39 percent believed that the Republican billionaire Donald Trump had won the debate.
It should be noted that Trump and Clinton declined to shake hands at the beginning of the debate as well as after it ended. Interestingly, following the debate, Clinton shook hands with the moderator and immediately walked off stage to the auditorium to meet her supporters, while Trump waited on stage for his family to climb the stairs and join him.
The third debate was divided into six time segments of 15 minutes each, and each candidate had two minutes to answer the questions during a segment. The discussion involved six topics: immigration, public debt and entitlements, the Supreme Court, economy, foreign hot spots, and the fitness of candidates to be president. It was moderated by Fox News’ journalist Chris Wallace, known for his aggressive style of questioning the Democrats as well as the Republicans. It was that way during the latest debate, too.
The debate started cautiously but gradually erupted into a bitter dispute with the opponents constantly interrupting each other. Trump called Clinton “a nasty woman,” to which the Democratic candidate responded by advising the Republican to stop “whining” because he was losing the election.
Just like at all previous debates, the role of Russia and Vladimir Putin was a subject of discussion. Trump failed to clearly condemn the Kremlin’s involvement in hacking the Democratic Party’s websites and intervention in the American elections in general, as indicated by all 17 US intelligence agencies. Instead, he said that Putin “had no respect” for Clinton and was “outsmarting” Barack Obama. The Democratic candidate responded by saying that the Russian leader just wanted to put a puppet of his in the presidential office, thus hinting at Putin’s support for her opponent.
However, the real surprise was Trump’s reply to the moderator asking him whether he would accept the results of the election. He said as follows: “I will tell you at the time. I will keep you in suspense.” Clinton responded at once: “Every time Donald thinks things are not going in his direction, he claims whatever it is, is rigged against him.”
“THE PROBLEM IS THAT SOME AMERICAN VOTERS ARE DRIVEN MORE BY EMOTION THAN BY REASON”
Adrian KARATNYCKY, senior research fellow, US Atlantic Council; Myrmidon Group LLC, Washington D.C.:
“As a person who despises Donald Trump’s arrogance and braggadocio, I felt that he lost the debate. Nevertheless, for much of the debate, Trump tried his best to maintain a calm demeanor. In the end, he failed, in large part, because of his weak command of issues and facts. By contrast, Hillary Clinton spoke with confidence, a command of facts, and with dignity. The problem, however, is that some American voters are driven more by emotion, and specifically anger, than by reason. For them, Trump’s aggressive style is a source of his political attraction.
“Clearly, there will be no momentum for Trump from the discussion. With less than three weeks before Election Day, the debate may even add to Clinton’s current lead.
“Trump lost the debate because he was unable to focus attention on specific policy prescriptions, issues that are of paramount importance not to his core of supporters, but to undecided voters.
“With Trump behind by an average of 7 percent in dozens of recent polls and trailing in many states that he needs to win (North Carolina, Wisconsin, Colorado, Pennsylvania), I do not think he changed the direction of voter sentiment, which has been moving in Hillary Clinton’s direction since allegations of sexual improprieties were made against him by at least nine women. Trump, moreover, did no good to his cause by refusing to say that he would accept the results of the election in the event of his loss.
“Over 90 percent of US voters have already made up their minds on their preferences. And it is unlikely that the debate will sway them decisively against their current choice. Moreover, millions of Americans are able to vote in advance of the November 8 election date and have already cast their votes. As to the remainder, Mr. Trump would have needed to score a decisive victory in the debate, something that in my view he was unable to achieve given his harshness of tone, his crude rhetoric, and his loose command of the facts. These characteristics, coupled with allegations of his predatory sexual practices make it hard to see how the dynamics of the election will dramatically change as a result of yesterday’s debate.”
“TRUMP’S EMBRACE OF THE RUSSIAN LEADER IS WINNING HIM LITTLE SUPPORT”
“Most Americans will make their electoral choices based on domestic issues. And Trump supporters will be swayed primarily by their support for his anti-status quo views on the economy and his attacks on all economic and political elites. Most polls show that a clear majority agree Hillary Clinton is better suited to handle national security and foreign policy issues. However, Trump’s clear pro-Putin stance is not likely to help him, especially with East European, Baltic, and Ukrainian-American voters.
“In fact, the vast majority of voters view Putin very negatively and Mr. Trump’s embrace of the Russian leader is winning him little support. However, Trump’s ‘America First’ theme plays well to isolationist sentiments, which are strong in the US.
“Hillary Clinton has shown that she regards Putin as a tyrant and a menace to the international system. She is likely to pursue a more tough-minded policy than President Obama. This tough approach is likely to be reinforced by the recent transparent Russian government hacking of the emails of Clinton advisors, including Anthony Podesta and other of her closest associates.
“Trump continues to praise Putin as a strong leader and even as he is butchering innocent in Syria, Trump argues for an alliance with Russia against the Islamic State. While Trump declares rhetorical sympathy for Ukraine, he appears to be open to recognition of the illegal annexation of Crimea, and has suggested weakening US military commitments to members of the NATO alliance (which he has suggested is partly obsolete). These are dangerous views that have turned much of the Republican foreign policy establishment against him.”
ON THE VOTES OF UKRAINIAN AMERICANS
“Most American Ukrainians are now aware that the influence of the pro-Russia camp and the admiration that Trump has for Putin suggests that he is by far the more dangerous choice for both Ukraine and the NATO alliance. Moreover, Trump’s authoritarian tendencies and megalomania could create internal political instability in Ukraine. All this would play into Russia’s hands. Most Ukrainian Americans recognize this. Still a serious minority of Ukrainian Americans prefers to support Trump for his anti-immigrant and low taxation policies over the security of the homeland of their ancestors and despite his approving statement about Vladimir Putin.”
“THAT IS BAD NEWS FOR TRUMP AND GOOD NEWS FOR CLINTON”
Aubrey JEWETT, professor, Department of Political Science, University of Central Florida:
“The third debate was the most substantive debate in terms talking about actual policy. This was due in large part to the moderator, Chris Wallace, who was the best moderator of any of the presidential debates.
“Overall I think the debate was fairly even. Trump did well, but so did Clinton. Since Trump is behind in the polls he needed a clear win or at least for Clinton to make a major mistake. Neither of those two things happened so that is bad news for Trump and good news for Clinton.
“In addition, Trump’s refusal to say whether or not he would accept the results of the election is the dominant story coming out of the debate. This is bad news for Trump because it is a controversial position that will not likely gain him more voters. The United States has a very long history of the peaceful transfer of power in presidential elections and all previous nominees have accepted the results. Most recently even Democrat Al Gore who actually won the popular vote in 2000 but lost the Electoral College vote and thus the presidency politely conceded to the eventual winner George W. Bush once the recount was finished.
“Russia and Putin were discussed on several occasions during the debate. Clinton was extremely critical of Putin and Russia for being behind all of the computer hacks that have brought to light private emails that are potentially damaging to her campaign. Clinton accused Trump of being too friendly with Putin and encouraging Putin and Russia to interfere with an American election. Trump responded that he does not know Putin and that no one knows for sure who is hacking the emails. In addition, Trump said that Putin had time and again gotten the best of Obama and Clinton on foreign policy and that this hurt the United States and showed that Obama and Clinton were weak leaders on foreign policy. Trump also said that it would be a good thing if the US and Russia could become better allies in the future and work together on several world issues rather than being opponents.
“Since the collapse of the Soviet Union and failure of communism, foreign policy often has not had a big impact on American voters in presidential elections. In this election the health of the American economy is still the number-one issue in the minds of most voters. But there are a number of voters who are concerned with foreign policy issues including ISIS, Iran, Russia, North Korea, and international trade.”
“TRUMP WOULD RATHER WEAKEN, EVEN JEOPARDIZE, OUR DEMOCRACY, RATHER THAN ACCEPT THE DEFEAT”
Lincoln MITCHELL, political analyst, former Columbia University professor, author of the book The Democracy Promotion Paradox:
“It doesn’t really matter who won last night’s debate. Hillary Clinton was, as expected, more prepared, more fluent on policy, conducted herself better than her opponent and spoke more articulately. Donald Trump was his usual unprepared, unfocused, inconsistent, incomprehensible, disrespectful, and vulgar self. But none of that matters. It doesn’t matter that Donald Trump’s economic plan doesn’t add up, or whether or not he supported the Iraq War in 2003 (he did). Nor does it matter whether the American people are satisfied with Hillary Clinton’s explanation of the Clinton Foundation or whose understanding of the Supreme Court is better.
“The most important thing that occurred in last night’s debate was that Donald Trump refused to state definitively that he would accept the outcome of the election. When asked this question point blank by moderator Chris Wallace, Trump responded ‘I will tell you at the time,’ later adding ‘I’ll keep you in suspense,’ as if he was talking about a third rate reality television show rather than the future of democracy in the world’s most powerful country.
“By saying this, Trump deliberately sought to undermine the shared democratic values, mores and conventions that, more than anything else, define American political life. Thus far the Trump campaign has divided America, brought bigotry to the forefront of public life and taken our political dialog into its lowest level in generations, but that all pales compared to what he said last night. Make no mistake, the Republican nominee for President would rather weaken, even jeopardize, our democracy, rather than accept the defeat that is inevitable and probably will be resounding.”
