The Trump-Harris dispute captivated the political discourse among Americans, amplifying misrepresentations regarding migrant issues.
That's the latest from "The Revolutionizer", an NBC polling project that monitors what typical Americans are actually perceiving, consuming, and engaging with concerning the presidential candidates during the campaign.
In the latest survey – carried out Sept. 13-16 by Nielsen and Gallup on behalf of a research team from NBC, Harvard University, and Stanford University – more than half of what participants recollected hearing about Harris, and 40% of what they remembered hearing about Trump, revolved around the CBS News presidential debate held September 9.
This shift is noteworthy in a race where neither candidate has yet been encapsulated in Americans’ minds by any distinct, all-encompassing issue or narrative, as preceding Revolutionizer surveys have suggested. The poll was conducted mainly before news disseminated about an apparent second assassination attempt on Trump's life.
Post-debate, the survey recorded a spike in favorable sentiment surrounding discussions about Harris, while the conversation around Trump shifted more negatively – generally, the inverse of the shift in sentiments following the debate between Trump and President Joe Biden. And although Harris has generally garnered more positive responses than Trump throughout her campaign, the disparity between them expanded significantly this week. The newest shifts in sentiment, the poll revealed, were primarily stimulated by the debate.
"From what I've been observing and learning about, the general consensus is that Kamala Harris excelled in the debate, and she's been advocating for a second one, but Trump is resisting," one survey respondent commented. Another commended her performance, "She outperformed at the debate. Trump didn't see it coming."
This analysis of sentiment doesn't indicate that Trump's debate performance was itself poorly rated in this survey, although other polls designed to measure public perceptions of his performance suggest otherwise among those who tuned in. Instead, it suggests that what Americans said about his performance tended to be framed in detrimental terms.
Even among respondents who supported Trump, praise for his performance was less prevalent than criticism of what they perceived as biased moderation. "He performed well considering NBC is a biased news network," a respondent explained.
Also contributing to the negative sentiment surrounding Trump was the tone of responses focusing on immigration. In the most recent data, that largely concerned a debunked viral claim about the town of Springfield, Ohio – first propagated by Trump's vice presidential candidate, JD Vance, and later referenced by the former president on the debate stage – that has since precipitated a wave of racist hostility against the town's Haitian immigrant population. In the latest data about what respondents were citing for Trump, phrases relating to these claims eclipsed everything except for the phrase "debate" itself.
"During the debate with Kamala Harris, he mentioned that individuals were stealing pets and consuming them," one survey respondent noted. "I'll never forget that."
While some respondents referencing the story identified it as false – one described it as "inflammatory and racist disinformation" – others appeared to accept the unfounded claim as factual. "I've watched clips of the debate against Kamala, where he addressed the immigrant predicaments mostly," another responded. "Apparently, they're eating animals."
What participants recollected learning about Harris in the past week primarily focused on the debate itself, with phrases such as "watched," "presidential," and "policies" joining "debate" in the top 10. In its wake, the proportion mentioning the phrase "lie" to describe what they heard about Harris reached its highest point this election cycle and was cited by equal numbers of respondents as those who employed the term in reference to Trump.
A third debate-related theme emerged for Harris as well: the endorsement she received post-debate from Taylor Swift. The music icon's name was the fourth most referenced term in the post-debate data, and "endorse" ranked tenth.
Harris' debate performance and subsequent endorsement from Taylor Swift have dominated recent discussions in the realm of politics. Despite Trump's attempts to negotiate a second debate, the public's perception of him following the first debate has predominantly been negative, often framed in detrimental terms.
