The gloves came off in the second presidential debate, as Donald Trump suggested Hillary Clinton belonged in jail while she said he was unfit to serve unlike any previous Republican nominee.
Early snapshots suggested an improved performance from Trump from the first debate, but not necessarily a game changer. The Republican won the Frank Luntz focus group while Clinton won the CNN instant poll 57 percent to 34 percent. But even CNN found that 63 percent thought Trump exceeded expectations.
YouGov’s poll found a big gender gap. Women thought Clinton won by a 50 percent to 38 percent margin, while men picked Trump by 46 percent to 43 percent.
Trump and Clinton did not even shake hands when they came out to debate in St. Louis, Mo. “With prior Republican nominees for president, I disagreed with them,” Clinton said. “But I never questioned their fitness to serve. Donald Trump is different.”
All eyes were on Trump as he continues to take hits for the 2005 recording of lewd comments about women that was recently to the public. Clinton tried to show she was prepared to serve as president, while Trump worked to elevate Clinton scandals to the same level as his latest controversy, potentially demoralizing voters who dislike both major party candidates.
The second debate was originally expected to be an opportunity to improve on an uneven first debate performance that was widely judged a loss, perhaps following the example of running mate Mike Pence’s successful outing last week. Now the viability of his campaign is being questioned.
Since the release of a recording in which Trump speaks of attempting to seduce a married woman and engages in other vulgar talk, many Republican elected officials have rescinded their support for the presidential nominee. Trump’s own running mate took the unusual step of publicly rebuking him while House Speaker Paul Ryan canceled a joint appearance with the GOP nominee.
Trump came prepared to hit Bill Clinton’s sex scandals — and he did.
In an otherwise contrite videotaped statement Friday night, Trump declared, “Bill Clinton has actually abused women and Hillary has bullied, attacked, shamed and intimidated his victims. We will discuss this more in the coming days.”
Trump tweeted out an interview with Juanita Broaddrick, Kathleen Willey and Paula Jones, three women who have accused Bill Clinton of nonconsensual sexual behavior with them. The most damaging thing about Trump’s 2005 remarks is that he appears to be referring to or even boasting of nonconsensual behavior himself.
On Sunday night, Trump upped the ante by holding a press event with these Clinton accusers and then having them in the audience seated up front. He said he didn’t raise the issue in the first debate out of respect for Chelsea Clinton. Second time around, Bill Clinton had to walk by his accusers to take his seat to watch his wife.
“So many self-righteous hypocrites,” Trump tweeted in response to critics in both parties. “Watch their poll numbers — and their elections — go down!”
Democrats have warned Trump to leave Bill Clinton out of the debate. Republicans have also worried that doing so will make Hillary Clinton a more sympathetic figure and note that past GOP attacks on the 42nd president’s sexual history have backfired on the party. But Trump was willing to take the political risk.
Normally, the town hall format discourages personal attacks between the candidates. The voters who ask questions at these debates tend to plead for civility and criticize partisan division. One of the last questions from the crowd invited Clinton and Trump to praise each other. But the audience played a smaller role Sunday night than in previous town halls, as the moderators interjected more and the candidates engaged in lengthy exchanges.
“This debate is so negative its impact may be to depress turnout, even if Clinton is seen as having ‘won,'” said Southern Methodist University communications professor Stephanie Martin in a statement. “Low turnout likely benefits Trump.”
“Hillary depends on the Obama coalition to win, so voter enthusiasm matters more for her,” she added. “The poll tightening of several weeks ago was more about lost enthusiasm on the Clinton side than it was gains for Trump.”
Before the debate, Clinton Trump’s taped comments as “horrific” and her pinned tweet says, “Women have the power to stop Trump.” Trump’s problems have overshadowed leaked emails from her campaign chairman John Podesta, including some that play into the Republicans’ hands, such as Clinton expressing support for open borders within the hemisphere.
During the debate, she argued that contrary to Trump’s protestations, the tape is who he is. The question the will decide, she argued, is whether this is who we are as a country.
Trump said he was “embarrassed” by his comments and again apologized for them. But he also repeated the “locker room” banter defense from his initial statement on the subject, a response that struck many leading Republicans as inadequate.
Since the first debate, Clinton has rebounded from a bad September in national and battleground polls. Trump has perhaps faced the most difficult weekend of his campaign and will now rely his spirited performance to stem the bleeding among Republican endorsers.
The third and final debate between Clinton and Trump takes place in Las Vegas on Oct. 19.
