The third and final presidential debate between President Donald Trump and former Vice president Joe Biden is over and it was clear to everyone, even some skeptical media pundits, that President Trump stole the show as Biden distanced himself from two key swing states.
Vice President Biden did a good job sticking to his talking points, the script that he rehearsed during his debate prep, but a different, less combative Trump owned the former vice president.
Biden supporters and hard-lined Democrats like Florida Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell believe that Biden won the debate, but that was not the case.
.@JoeBiden won the debate.
Pass it on.
— Debbie Mucarsel-Powell (@DebbieforFL) October 23, 2020
Trump's repeated attack on Biden in questioning why for 8 years in the Obama administration he did none of the things he now says he will do if elected president, was Trump’s most effective point of attack.
ABC’s Jake Tapper agreed.
“Biden struggled when Trump confronted him with the question of 'you’ve been in politics for 47 years, you were Vice President for 8 years, why didn’t you do that then?” said Tapper.
But while both men appeared to control their emotions and not talk over one another like they did in the first debate, the moment may have tipped the scales in favor of Trump was when the men were asked about the environment.
Biden’s assertion that he would “close down the oil industry” could very well have sunk him in the crucially important swing states of Pennsylvania and Ohio.
Biden made the ill-fated oil industry remark after Trump asked him if he would indeed close down the industry.
Trump: “Would he close down the oil industry?” “Would you close down the oil industry?”
Biden: “I would transition from the oil industry, yes,” Biden responded.
Trump: “That’s a big statement.”
Biden: “It is a big statement, because…the oil industry pollutes, significantly.” “It has to be replaced by renewable energy over time. And I’d stop giving to the oil industry—I’d stop giving them federal subsidies. [Trump] won’t give federal subsidies to solar and wind. Why are we giving it to the oil industry?”
But considering that Pennsylvania is once again in play this election cycle and that it has a massive fracking operation, Biden just lost that state as well.
Biden may have already lost Pennsylvania when he and Vice presidential candidate Kamala Harris both said that they wanted to end fracking.
