Prompt Images
There is a saying in golf that the Masters doesn’t begin until the back nine on Sunday. I’d say something similar about this year’s Presidential elections. Despite the seemingly endless stream of primary debates, numerous “Super Tuesday” insults and scandals, wild polling swings in both directions, and political conventions, I knew this race would not truly begin until Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton squared off in a debate.
On Monday night, the real battle began at Hofstra University.
Because of the intense nature of this campaign, the heated rhetoric on both sides and the polarizing, yet fascinating nature of both of the candidates, the anticipation leading up to this debate was immense. Because I live in such close proximity to Washington D.C., the home of American Politics, I decided to make the short trip down to experience the debate live in our Nation’s Capital.
Pregame
We arrived at Busboys and Poets an hour before kickoff. Busboys is a socially-conscious D.C. restaurant chain known for hosting progressive community events. The kind of place where two separate watch parties happened, one on each level of the restaurant.
Thankfully, my group secured some seats shortly before a rush of people swarmed the upper level of the bar trying to get the best of the small TV perched over the bar. On this floor, the event was sponsored by DC United Against Hate, an organization packed with as many Hillary supporters as Trump opposers. The supporters in attendance were a melting pot of age, race, and ethnicity.
They came with their anti-Trump drinking games and Bingo cards, showing off their unequivocal progressive leanings. Basically, I was surrounded by the progressive equivalent of ultras. While I am by no means Hillary’s biggest fan, I am a Democrat and being around this group gave me those butterflies in my stomach, like before your favorite team is about to take the field. It felt like a home game, like I was packing into a bar to watch the Super Bowl with fellow Ravens fans or a Word Series Game 7 with some Orioles.
Everyone was milling about the bar, grabbing drinks but trying to prognosticate what would happen: “Will she get sick or go on a coughing fit?” or “Is he going to be a maniac or is he going to try and hold it together?” While these conversations happened, people scrolled their Twitter and Facebook feeds, taking in some last minute social interaction, as if it wasn’t all around us.
As the volume on the TVs went way up and Lester Holt began his introduction, you could cut the tension in the bar with a knife. The two candidates strode out, gave each other an awkward handshake and we were off.
First Quarter
Even though I watched this with a very progressive group in a very progressive bar in perhaps the most liberal city in America, I was also very interested as to what kind of Trump would show up today. After his opening, it was clear that Trump has been listening to his so called “Trump Whisperer” Kellyanne Conway, striking a more measured tone. As both of the candidates made their way through the “American Prosperity” portion of the debate, the mood at the bar had lightened a bit.
Around me, people focused on their bingo cards and drinking games, but no one seemed quite comfortable yet. It was very much akin to the period in a boxing match where the fighters feel each other out. Trump definitely spoke to the swing-state voters he needs as he hammered Clinton on NAFTA , TPP, and manufacturing, while painting her as a D.C. insider who has failed to fix the broken political system.
Going into the debate, I had assumed the bar would be set really low for Trump, I thought the reports that Trump had blown off debate prep were foolish. He seemed ready. Hillary was also ready. She smiled, avoided interrupting and made clear and articulate arguments. Around the bar, a few cheers went up for Hillary’s mention of wage equality for women, and there was an audible woop/groan after her first one-liner of the night, on Trump’s economic plan (Trumped-up, trickle down economics).
I, like many others, waited patiently for the gloves to come off and the intensity to come up a notch.
Second Quarter
A cacophony of boos cascaded throughout the venue when Trump stated that his wanting the housing market to collapse was called “good business.” It followed with an eruption of cheers when Hilary landed the first zinger of the night, calling out Donald Trump’s lie regarding his beliefs about climate change.
Trump’s response was a bit shocking; he claimed Hillary Clinton has been fighting ISIS her entire career, which got a collective WTF from everyone in attendance. He then went on his first extended rant of the night, as Lester Holt grilled him about the details of his tax plan. The subject quickly moved to his own taxes.
As he ranted about why he wouldn’t release his tax returns, Hillary snuck in a quick jab, asserting that Donald Trump had something to hide, which clearly got under his skin. In response, he claimed that he would release his tax returns when Hillary releases the 33,000 emails on her private server. This exchange led to an inevitable question on the emails, to which Hillary gave her standard canned response.
I shook my head. Like most voters, I’ve always felt that Hillary has been a bit contrite over this issue. As a veteran, if I had used my own private email server and shared sensitive information, I would be in a hole somewhere and not writing this piece. Military officials have had their careers ruined for doing less. She hasn’t put the issue to rest, which makes voters feel like she can’t put the issue to rest. And as a result, Trump will continue to tout this line in the post-debate spin and on the trail for the weeks to come.
Halftime
That exchange more or less put us at the halfway point, and while Trump performed better than I expected, Hillary held the slight advantage. So far, it was a good contest.
Inside Busboys, I was amazed at how everyone’s eyes were still glued to the TV. I took a quick break from scribbling notes down and noticed that a German TV crew was filming in the bar and multiple photographers took pictures to capture the crowd’s reactions. Seeing the cameras in the bar made me think of this clip from one of my favorite shows (RIP Newsroom), and the fact that people all around the world do tune in to see our elections.
Third Quarter
It felt right that Lester Holt opened the next section on race relations. As a Black man, I felt both candidates had a lot of work to do on the topic, which has been even more pronounced over the past year. Hillary has been very brazen about her pandering to the African-American community and her super-predator comment combined with Bill’s War on Drugs while he was President (which had a profound impact on arrests in the Black community), have only contributed to the growing criminal justice epidemic in America.
In my opinion, Donald Trump’s outreach has not been that much better. His sleazy sales pitch of “your communities are a disaster, you walk down the street and get shot, so vote for me, what else do you have to lose?!” unsurprisingly hasn’t been that effective. At Busboys, there were a host of minorities like me in the crowd, and I was curious to see how everyone would react.
The back-and-forth on this was some of my favorite:
- Hillary called out Trump for the negative portrayal of African-American communities while advocating for more community policing and rebuilding the trust between communities and police. Cheers broke out after Hillary finished her points, and I noticed one Black woman celebrating each of these points enthusiastically jumping up down with her fist raised.
- Trump went back to his bread and butter of Law and Order, calling Hillary on her super-predator comment. He went on to tout his new proposal, straight out of the Rudy Giuliani playbook, of adopting Stop and Frisk nationwide. This led to our first moderator based fact-check (Stop and Frisk was ruled unconstitutional) and a fiery exchange between both candidates.
- Trump asserted that Clinton was doing nothing while he was continuing his month long outreach into the AA community, Clinton calmly responded:
“I think Donald just criticized me for preparing for this debate. You know what else I prepared for, I prepared to be President. And I think that’s a good thing.”
BOOM.
MIC DROP.
I thought the roof was going to come off, the place was so loud. At that moment, I felt all the momentum shift and the wheels really started to come off for Trump. He never really answered the question on what changed his mind regarding Obama’s birtherism, instead shifting blame to Hillary, a charge that doesn’t quite stick.
Trump continued to grasp at straws, claiming that he because he opened a club in Palm Beach to African-Americans and Muslims, that exonerated him for previously being sued by the Justice Department for racial discrimination. It was nonsensical and non sequitur. Once this segment concluded, it was easy to see why he has Don King, a convicted felon, as his leading advocate in the African-American community.
Fourth Quarter
At this point, the crowd in Busboys was energized as we headed into the final stages of the debate. The opening of the Securing America portion featured a confusing portion on “the cyber” but got more interesting when Trump went on two tirades that were interesting not only because of their substance, but also the responses of bewilderment, laughter, taunts, and shouts of BINGO! heard all around the restaurant:
- He went on a bizarre rant trying to defend his stance on the Iraq war by telling everyone to call Sean Hannity, leading to the hilarious hashtag #nobodycallsseanhannity.
- He claimed his temperament was his greatest asset, which elicited laughter from the crowd and all of the patrons at Busboys, but also led to the Hillary reminding viewers of one of her most memorable lines from her convention speech.
At this point, Hillary was in the zone. She did a little shimmy after she got a chance to respond and just picked apart every Trump argument like an expert quarterback.
As Trump attacked her for her “non-Presidential look” and her stamina, not only did she cite the fact that she has logged the most miles as Secretary of State, but also then she went BACK IN and lit Trump up for his insulting comments towards women. That was the final salvo before the debate ended with raucous cheers, whistling, and applause from the moderately buzzed, Bingo winning crowd.
Postgame
While most sports have clear winners and losers, politics is subjective and open to interpretation. Because of this, the conversation continues long after the debate is over, and the last reporter has left the spin room. In our bubble at Busboys, it really felt like Clinton won the debate, and many media polls and focus groups tended to agree with us. However, Trump won a majority of online polls and the hashtag #TrumpWon trended at #1 on Twitter all day Tuesday.
The main event definitely lived up to the hype, but there is still much more to be discussed. Basket of Deplorables, immigration, Benghazi, The Wall, abortion, social issues, and the bane of conservatives’ existence, OBAMACARE, did not come up. Both sides will have to go back to the drawing board to improve their respective messages and shore up more voters.
After my first public viewing of a presidential debate, I get the allure of watching with a bunch of wonks and politicos. There was cheering, and booing, and so much energy around the room. I was also fascinated to see that no one was checking Twitter or Facebook looking for that latest political meme to retweet and/or like. There was a laser-like focus on that small TV screen, as if you were watching your favorite team go to battle. I know it was D.C., but still, I found the fixation and focus fascinating.
While there are few similarities between sports and politics, I enjoyed seeing some of them play out before my eyes on Monday.
Round 2 is October 9th. 40 days until election day. Get out and vote!
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