Team Harris Is Well Aware a Bad Debate With Trump ‘Could Cost Us the Election’

After two months of upheaval, the race between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump is a dead heat — and the stakes of Tuesday’s debate couldn’t be higher

The past two months in American politics have been a whirlwind: Joe Biden fumbled the first debate so badly he had to drop out of the presidential race. Someone tried to assassinate Donald Trump. The new Democratic nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris, reinvigorated the party’s presidential hopes, sparking widespread joy among a previously dejected base while generating an unprecedented fundraising groundswell.

On the surface, it may have seemed like the race fundamentally changed: Harris had an impeccable campaign launch, and Trump has been in absolute hell — angrily posting away his feelings while repeatedly complaining that Harris replaced Biden as the nominee. And yet, despite all the upheaval, the broader contours of the 2024 election remain eerily similar: The race is deadly close — and Trump may well still be the favorite.

The stakes of Tuesday’s presidential debate in Philadelphia — the second of the campaign, and the first between Harris and Trump — could not possibly be higher. With the race between the vice president and the former president trending uncomfortably close — particularly in recent private and public polls conducted in the handful of battleground states that will decide the election — various officials in each camp say Tuesday night’s contest could make or break their candidate’s chances at taking the White House.

Those on Team Harris believe the debate is crucial to preserving the democratic order in the face of Trump’s fascistic whims.

“There is no room for error. None,” says a Harris ally, who adds that a lackluster performance could “cost us the election.”

In the estimations of Democrats working on her campaign, the debate is very likely to set the tone — in the political press and elsewhere — for the final two-month sprint of the 2024 contest. And if Harris fails to define herself to the American people on live television, it could prove catastrophic, in a presidential election that appears destined to be fought at the margins.

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New polling from The New York Times and Siena College indicates many voters still want to know more about Harris and her plans for what she would do as president. A majority of likely voters think Harris deserves blame for rising prices and for “problems at the border,” as the Times/Siena survey put it — suggesting that Republicans’ attacks on Harris and attempts to define her may be resonating.

So much for coasting on positive vibes.

The Harris campaign finally published an issues page on its website Sunday, a month and a half since she became the presumptive Democratic nominee, two days before the debate. Now, she needs to communicate her policy vision directly to the millions of Americans who will tune in on Tuesday, all while standing a few feet away from Trump.

“It will be devastating if we screw this up,” one Harris adviser tells Rolling Stone, adding: “It really is one of those ‘failure is not an option’ kinds of evenings, isn’t it?”

As Harris and Trump have prepared for Tuesday night in Philly, their campaigns have actively brainstormed tactics and canned lines that each side thinks would work best at getting under the other candidate’s skin — in the hopes of provoking an overreaction or stumble that sticks in the minds of voters.

In the lead-up to the debate, Trump’s team and allies have pressed him to be “happy Trump” at the debate, not “mean, bully Trump,” according to the Times.

According to two sources with knowledge of the matter, when some members of Team Harris were reviewing recent and older videos of Trump — at events, during media interviews, onstage at televised debates — they noticed that Trump is sometimes not as easily baited as some would assume.

“Donald Trump is famous for being easily lured into acting like the oaf and bully that he is, but if you watch him at points during, and also after, his time in office, you will be able to spot the times when he knows somebody is trying to get a rise out of him, and then he just refuses to give them what they want … at least for that short amount of time,” one of these sources says.

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In the weeks leading up to the Philadelphia debate, this led to further brainstorming among these Harris 2024 officials, who wanted to flesh out every angle for the kinds of onstage barbs and attacks that stood a chance at effectively triggering the former president.

The two sources declined to share what the new ideas were, which they added were shared with the vice president, as they aim to catch Trump off-guard on Tuesday.