CNN Shines as Pundits Disagree on Biden vs. Trump Winner

It was billed as the first debate between the current and former president. Calling it that was misleading. True, it was the first of two TV debates in 2024.  But as anyone who follows politics knows the two have been debating each other for years, even though most of the time the current president attacked the former president without using his name.

My first job at a PR agency, after several years as a reporter and editor at New York City dailies and wire services, was with a political shop, where I worked on local, state-wide and presidential campaigns. I enjoyed the excitement of working on campaigns, but departed the political scene, when I was recruited twice by international agencies, Arthur Cantor/Advance Public Relations, where I toiled for 10 years, then by Burson-Marsteller, during the days it was the leading international agency, where I stayed for almost a quarter of a century before leaving to open up my own consultancy. At Burson, while not working on candidate campaigns, I worked on politically-associated campaigns. I also volunteered to provide pro-bono PR advice to a candidate in the community where I lived.

So when I tuned in CNN on June 27 to watch the televised first of the two scheduled debates, I viewed it through the eyes of a political operative. not as an advocate for a candidate.

It should be noted that even before the first words were uttered on the debate stage Trump supporters, including Republican National Committee (RNC) co-Chair Lara Trump, said that debate was rigged in favor of Mr.  Biden.  They also raged against CNN’s Jake Tapper and Dana Bash, saying “they get to set all the rules.”

And the New York Times reported on June 15, “Mr. Trump has argued that he is taking on not just Mr. Biden but also a television network because CNN is hostile to him: “CNN is the enemy,” he said on a podcast, mocking one of the two moderators, Jake Tapper, as “Fake Tapper.” Mr. Tapper was joined by Dana Bash, as debate moderators. Still, the former president predicted the network would be “as fair as they can be.”

Here are my pre-debate observations

Going into the debate, Mr. Biden had much more ammunition with which to attack Mr. Trump than the former president had to attack Mr. Biden. 

Mr. Biden was armed with the facts that Mr. Trump is a convicted felon, who will be the defendant in three more criminal trials; has been impeached twice; who brags about being the person who led to the Supreme Court’s overturning Roe v. Wade; will be in the position to nominate future Justices if elected, and was instrumental in encouraging his backers to upstage democracy by encouraging an insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021, as well as Mr. Trump saying that he’ll be a dictator on day one of his new presidency. Mr. Biden also could remind viewers of the turmoil of the Trump presidency and that he would exact retribution against his enemies and pardon people convicted of breaking into the Capitol on Jan. 6. In my opinion the two strongest attack points against Mr. Trump are the abortion and democracy issues.

Mr. Trump’s best arguments are that during his administration he kept the U.S. out of war and that there were no wars in Ukraine and Gaza. In addition, that Mr. Biden is mentally diminished; that Mr. Biden’s policies about the southern border lets terrorists enter the U.S., including suspected ISIS ones, and how the cost of everyday living has risen during Mr. Biden’s administration. In my opinion the two strongest attack points against Mr. Biden are the cost of living and border issues.

Here are my opinions on how the debaters and moderators did.

The announcers:

Bash: Did as good a job as possible considering she was restricted from calling out lies during answers.
Tapper: Same as above, higher marks for continually pressing Trump to answer the questions.

But perhaps the most important aspect of the debate had nothing to do with the words spoken by the candidates. It was their demeanor. Would the president appear tired and weak, or would his performance convince viewers that he has the mental capacity and stamina that a president should have. Would the former president remain calm and focused or would he fly off the handle, reminding viewers of the four years of turmoil during his presidency.

Biden: Was too soft spoken, at times was difficult to understand and at times seemed to lose his thoughts. But he answered the questions.

Trump: Unlike previous TV appearances, he kept calm, but refused to answer questions.

In Conclusion

Trump:  Consistently used talking points to attack the president, but reverting to his usual tactics almost all his answers were lies. He took credit for things that Biden did, and his answers to the moderator’s questions were filled with exaggerations and mistruths.

Biden:  Was able to provide details when answering questions, but because he could not speak in a forceful manner often sounded confused and old.

I think Trump won the debate, with a caveat. Even though the former president refused to answer questions and continually lied when he did, by comparison to Biden’s demeanor he seemed much more vigorous then the president. The caveat is that the after debate analysis will show that Trump lied consistently. And that might affect how viewers feel about the debate.

But from a pure PR perspective CNN was the clear winner. By allowing other stations to televise the debate, CNN, the least watched of the three major cable networks, exposed itself to millions of new viewers. It was a brilliant PR strategy, which might result in CNN gaining an increased audience. But like Biden and Trump, who will not know for some time if their debate strategies helped move their needles permanently, (debaters usually get a short-lived bump if they do well), CNN will also have to wait