First 2020 presidential debate

By Melissa Macaya, Veronica Rocha, Kyle Blaine and Jessica Estepa, CNN

Updated 9:24 AM ET, Wed September 30, 2020
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10:29 p.m. ET, September 29, 2020

Trump is controlling tonight's debate — that doesn't mean he's winning it

Analysis from CNN's Jeff Zeleny

President Donald Trump speaks during the first presidential debate against former Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden.
President Donald Trump speaks during the first presidential debate against former Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden. Morry Gash/Pool/Getty Images

President Trump is controlling tonight’s debate – that doesn’t mean he’s winning it.

For much of the first hour, Trump dominated the discussion, talked over his rival, steamrolled the moderator – often without any interruption. 

It’s clear that the President is trying to win the moment, while Joe Biden seems to be playing more of a long game. Yet at times, he seemed to all recede from the stage. To those listening – and not watching – he went for stretches of time without speaking, intent on biting his tongue. 

Judging the winner may be an impossible task. Finding the loser is easy: American voters.

It’s an open question whether any undecided voters – believe it or not, they do exist – were given any measure of clarity. Perhaps that was the President’s aim — to muddy the waters and run out the clock.

But with more than one million ballots already cast, it’s hard to see how the first debate changed the trajectory of the race. And Trump needed that tonight.

10:29 p.m. ET, September 29, 2020

Fact check: Trump claims Biden wants to shut down the country

From CNN's Tara Subramaniam

President Donald Trump claimed several times that Joe Biden wants to shut down the country to address the coronavirus. “He wants to shut down this country and I want to keep it open,” Trump said.

10:21 p.m. ET, September 29, 2020

Biden: Trump’s view of the suburbs is backward

From CNN's Gregory Krieg

President Donald Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden participate in the first presidential debate.
President Donald Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden participate in the first presidential debate. Olivier Douliery/Pool/Getty Images

President Trump has been warning throughout the campaign that suburbs are at risk of succumbing to what he describes as something like an anarchist revolution – a thinly coded appeal to White voters the President believes are turned off by anti-racist protests against police violence.

Joe Biden dismissed those claims and fired back tonight, telling a much different story of who lives in the suburbs and the threat they’re facing.

“I was raised in the suburbs. This is not 1950,” Biden said. “All these dog whistles and racism don't work anymore. Suburbs are by and large integrated.”

Biden continued, saying, “What really is a threat to the suburbs and their safety is his failure to deal with Covid-19.”

The former vice president also described climate change as the kind of existential threat that Trump attributes to protests.

“His failure to deal with the environment" is a bigger issue, Biden said. "They're being flooded and burned out because (of) his refusal to do anything. That's why the suburbs are in trouble.” 
10:17 p.m. ET, September 29, 2020

Here's who has talked the most in the first hour

We're just over an hour into the debate, and both candidates were about even in speaking time at the one hour mark with more than 27 minutes.

10:31 p.m. ET, September 29, 2020

Biden: Trump uses "everything as a dog whistle to try to generate racist hatred"

From CNN's Dan Merica

Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden participates in the first presidential debate against U.S. President Donald Trump.
Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden participates in the first presidential debate against U.S. President Donald Trump. Win McNamee/Getty Images

Joe Biden said that President Trump attempts to make everything into a racial “dog whistle” tonight, arguing that the President has “done virtually nothing” for African Americans during his time as president.

During a prolonged segment on race, the two fought over who would handle issues of race, culminating in Biden calling Trump a racist.

Asked why he would be better at tackling issues of race, Biden attacked Trump for equivocating on the racist right-wing rally in Charlottesville in 2017 with the protests in response and the fact that protesters outside the White House were forcibly moved earlier this year so the President could walk to a nearby church.

“This is a president who uses everything as a dog whistle to try to generate racist hatred, division,” Biden said. “This man has done virtually nothing” for Black Americans.

Trump responded to the attack by noting Biden’s role in passing the 1994 crime bill, a law that led to significant increases in the incarceration of Black Americans.

“I’m letting people out of jail…” Trump said, pointing to criminal justice reform he passed in his first term. “You have treated the Black community about as bad as anybody in this country.”

Watch the exchange:

10:47 p.m. ET, September 29, 2020

Biden responds to Trump's attacks on his son: "This is not about my family"

From CNN's Kevin Liptak

Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden participates in the first presidential debate against President Donald Trump.
Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden participates in the first presidential debate against President Donald Trump. Scott Olson/Getty Images

It took about 45 minutes for President Trump to raise an issue his advisers said he was itching to bring up: Hunter Biden.

Trump and his allies have repeatedly made unfounded and false claims to allege that the former vice president and his son acted corruptly in Ukraine. 

It’s something Republicans believed at one point would dominate this year’s campaign, though has failed to erupt amid a global pandemic, nationwide protests and an economic downturn.

Still, some Democrats had wondered how Biden would respond when the topic arose. Some feared he would lose his cool, sensitive to matters of family.

Instead, Biden seem prepared and spoke straight-to-camera as he sought to rebut Trump’s claims his son engaged in wrongdoing when he served on the board of a Ukrainian energy company.

"This is not about my family or his family, this is about your family — the American people," Biden said. "He doesn't want to talk about what you need."

Here's the moment:

10:05 p.m. ET, September 29, 2020

Trump and Biden depict starkly different realities on coronavirus

From CNN's Maegan Vazquez

President Donald Trump speaks during the first presidential debate against former Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden.
President Donald Trump speaks during the first presidential debate against former Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden. Morry Gash/Pool/Getty Images

President Trump and former vice president Joe Biden offered starkly different versions of the federal government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic.

When both candidates were asked about the handling of the pandemic during the debate, Biden pointed to the staggering number of Americans who have died or contracted coronavirus since the pandemic reached US shores.

“When he was presented with that number, (Trump) said, ‘It is what it is.’ Well, it is what it is because you are who you are. That’s why it is. The President has no plan. He hasn’t laid out anything. He knew all the way back in February how serious this … was,” Biden said, referencing Trump’s interviews with journalist Bob Woodward in which he indicated he wanted to play the coronavirus down in order not to create national panic.

“You don’t panic. He panicked,” Biden added.

Trump retorted, telling Biden, "You could never have done the job we did” and citing the Obama administration’s handling of the swine flu.

“We got the gowns. We got the masks. We made the ventilators. You wouldn’t have made ventilators. And now we’re weeks away from a vaccine. We’re doing therapeutics already. Fewer people are dying,” Trump said, blaming China for the virus and arguing that his administration’s perceived lack of success in its handling of the pandemic is the result of bad press.

“I’ll tell you, Joe, you could never have done the job that we did. You don’t have it in your blood. You could’ve never done that, Joe,” Trump added. 

The President then brought up the Trump administration's plan to quickly distribute a coronavirus vaccine once it is ready to be deployed. But Biden pushed back, questioning why Americans should trust someone who lies so frequently.

“This is the same man who told you by Easter this would be gone away. By the warm weather, it’d be gone — like a miracle. And by the way, maybe you could inject some bleach into your arm," Biden said.

Trump claimed during the debate that the bleach comment he made earlier this year was sarcastic. CNN has fact checked this before, and there was simply no indication that he was being anything less than serious. 

10:35 p.m. ET, September 29, 2020

Trump on NYT report on his taxes: "I don't want to pay tax"

From CNN's Kevin Liptak

President Donald Trump participates in the first presidential debate against Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden.
President Donald Trump participates in the first presidential debate against Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden. Win McNamee/Getty Images

President Trump offered a frank defense of himself when questioned about new reporting on the minimal amount in income tax he’s paid: “I don’t want to pay tax.”

It was a defense that amounted to Trump saying the tax loopholes for wealthy Americans are there to exploit — even if, at the same time, he tried to claim he’s paid “millions of dollars” in taxes in the first years of his presidency.

It was a contradictory response, but one that seems to capture how Trump has sought to explain himself since The New York Times first reported details of his tax returns over the weekend.

Trump has simultaneously sought to claim he was doing what everyone else was by avoiding taxes while also insisting he pays millions in taxes, which contradicts the Times reporting that he paid $750 in income taxes in 2016 and 2017.

Somewhat surprisingly, Biden did not seem to grasp on to Trump’s answers for long, even though his campaign has made it a major issue over the past several days.

Watch moment:

10:35 p.m. ET, September 29, 2020

Wallace asks Trump to stop interrupting

From CNN's Maureen Chowdhury

Source: Pool
Source: Pool

After a chaotic first half of the debate, moderator Chris Wallace asked President Trump to stop interrupting.

"Gentlemen! I hate to raise my voice... So, here's the deal we have six segments. We have ended that segment, we're going to go to the next segment. In that segment you each are going to have two uninterrupted moments. In those two [uninterrupted] minutes, Mr. President, you can say anything you want... I think that the country would be better served if we allowed both people to speak with fewer interruptions. I'm appealing to you, sir, to do that," Wallace said.

When Trump tried to push back by stating Biden had interrupted him, Wallace added, "Frankly, you've been doing more interrupting than he has."