Kamala Harris Just Taught a Debate Clinic. You’re Welcome.
Her sparring with Biden will be one memorable moment from the second Democratic presidential debate – and that’s one more than most candidates will have.
Who wants to be president?
Photographer: Drew Angerer/Getty Images
It’s a fool’s game to predict how voters will react to nomination debate performances – or, for that matter, how the media will construct the story of any debate. So I won’t play that game.
What I will say is that Senator Kamala Harris of California put on a clinic Thursday night in how to do these events. From early on in the second Democratic presidential debate until her final statement, she earned her place in the upper tier of candidates who have ever participated in these events. Again, that doesn’t guarantee anything; Barack Obama won a nomination despite never really mastering that particular format, while several candidates who were good at debates never went anywhere. But yes, Harris is good at it.