Donald Trump probably didn’t improve his chances of winning the presidency by turning in perhaps the nastiest debate performance in modern American history, but he might have succeeded in rallying enough Republican support to stem calls that he quit the race.
Seeking to make Hillary Clinton as radioactive as he has become after the release of a 2005 video in which he boasted of grabbing women by their genitals, Trump played the provocateur even before walking onto the debate stage.
Trump’s attacks were sharper and more focused than in their first encounter. But Clinton once again was heralded in a post-debate CNN poll as the winner, besting Trump on style as the Republican nominee once again struggled to keep his cool. He frequently interrupted Clinton, complained about unfair treatment from the moderators and at one point hovered behind his opponent.
“This was like watching a guy on death row commit suicide,” said Thad Kousser, a professor of politics at UC San Diego. “He pushed the idea that you might not like me, but you should not like her, either. … But I think debates are about the personality that comes across. And presidential debates are about whether that personality is presidential.”
Trump’s first attack came 90 minutes before the debate began when he hosted an impromptu news conference with four women including Juanita Broaddrick, who has accused Bill Clinton of rape, and Paula Jones, a former Arkansas state employee, who sued him for sexual harassment.
Then, after the two candidates took the debate stage and declined to shake hands, Trump attacked his rival in deeply personal terms, referring to her as “the devil” and saying that “she has tremendous hatred in her heart” and threatening, if elected, to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate Clinton’s use of a private email server.
“It was one of the nastiest debates I’ve ever seen,” said Sherry Bebitch Jeffe, a veteran political analyst at the University of Southern California. “Can you imagine having your children view this as an example of how America’s presidential campaigns are conducted — as an example of the workings of American democracy?”
Trump’s primary focus Sunday was shoring up support among his core supporters who he’ll need to blunt calls from leading Republicans to quit the race after the unearthing of his comments about groping women and making advances on a married woman, which were recorded 11 years ago on an “Access Hollywood” bus.
“It was red meat for the base,” Bebitch Jeffe said. “He is pushing this prod into the Hillary haters – many of whom are feeling defeated because of the ‘Access Hollywood’ tape — to get them up and get them out to vote. What I think he’s banking on is the evangelicals’ hatred of Hillary will be greater than their disgust with the tape.”
After watching the 90-minute town hall debate, voters across the Bay Area expressed frustration and disappointment with the candidates, regardless of their political party.
At a gathering of San Mateo County GOP at the Dutch Goose sports bar in Menlo Park, the two dozen Republicans were divided over their support for Trump, most preferring to discuss their passion for local elections instead.
“At some point I wanted to vote for him, but the more he talks, the less I want to vote for him,” said Gabriella Makstman, who is running for a Daly City Council seat.
But John Boyle, a former Menlo Park mayor, said that despite the video, he will vote for Trump over Clinton.
“I’m frustrated by the fact that he said those things, even though it was 10 years ago, but it was not a deal breaker,” Boyle said. “What’s more important is the direction each candidate would take our country.”
At a Round Table Pizza with fellow Republicans in Fremont, Lori Drake, past chairwoman of the Alameda County Republican Party, said Trump appeared exhausted and ill-focused at the debate and showed little remorse for the lewd comments he made in 2005.
“I was leaning toward Trump until this last thing and now I”m like: What am I going to do now?” Drake said.
She didn’t like Clinton’s debate performance either, calling her “just the same old mechanical machine.”
Former Fremont City Councilwoman Anu Natarajan, 53, a Democrat, was impressed by Clinton, but said Trump did better than she expected.
“He came off as a high school bully, but I think he had some points that probably resonated with a lot of his base,” including Clinton’s email scandal and the problems with Obamacare, she said.
Ellis Goldberg, 70, president of the Tri-Valley Democratic Club, who campaigned heavily during the primary for Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, said he wishes he had better choices at this point in the election cycle.
“This is a campaign of voter suppression: the ‘I can get my folks to hate you more than you can get your folks to hate me,’” he said in a phone interview from his Danville home. “It’s even worse than the lesser of two evils.”
Jonathan Madison, chairman of the San Mateo County Young Republicans, said the best part of the debate came at the end, when a man from the audience asked each candidate to say something nice about the other.
“I think we need more of that, frankly,” Madison said at the Dutch Goose gathering in Menlo Park. “We can’t find our savior in either candidate. We need values, an awakening of values.”
