On Friday, we published a list of 25 questions that ABC’s David Muir and Linsey Davis should ask Vice President Kamala Harris at Tuesday’s debate with former President Donald Trump. However, the duo would ask only two of them.
On the good side of the list, Davis asked, “I do want to ask, would you support any restrictions on a woman's right to an abortion?”
Much later, Davis would ask, “In 2017, you supported Bernie Sanders' proposal to do away with private insurance and create a government-run health care system. Two years later, you proposed a plan that included a private insurance option. What is your plan today?”
Kamala Harris refuses to answer the question from ABC's Linsey Davis whether she "support[s] any restrictions on a woman's right to an abortion" pic.twitter.com/8pQcrWxRcY
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) September 11, 2024
ABC also rehashed Harris’s past positions on the border and fracking that were on our previous list of questions that CNN’s Dana Bash should ask Harris.
The bad came when Muir asked, “I want to get your thoughts on support for Ukraine in this moment. But also, as commander-in-chief, if elected, how would you deal with Vladimir Putin, and would it be any different from what we're seeing from President Biden?”
One of our questions touched on President Biden’s ban on liquefied natural gas exports, which called into question whether Democrats’ environmental activist class is more important to the White House than walking the walk on being tough on Russia. Muir’s question was too vague and open-ended to count.
For the ugly, on education policy, Harris was not asked about thoughts about Title IX when it comes to the intersection of women’s sports and transgenderism. Nor was she asked about Title VI and how colleges have become a hotbed for anti-American, anti-Israel, and anti-Semitic activity.
On foreign policy and national security, both candidates were pressed from the left on what they would do to break the impasse between Israel and Hamas on ceasefire talks, even as Biden himself reportedly questions the wisdom of the premise after Hamas murdered six hostages. Davis also lobbed a softball Harris’s way when she declared, “Vice President Harris, he says you hate Israel,” but she was not asked about the administration’s pre-October 7 record that included things like removing the Houthis from the terrorist list despite the fact the Navy has been battling them in the Red Sea for the last 11 months.
There was plenty of talk about rules and norms, but Harris managed to avoid being asked whether she would expand the Supreme Court or support eliminating the filibuster. However, she was asked, “One of your campaign's top lawyers responded, saying, ‘We won't let Donald Trump intimidate us. We won't let him suppress the vote.’ Is that what you believe he's trying to do here?”
At the end, both candidates were asked what they would do to fight climate change, but despite constantly fighting with Trump, the moderators did not press Harris on the tensions between union manufacturers and environmentalists or whether she believes cooperating with China on climate change is more important than resisting Chinese power and influence.
