>> woodruff: good evening i'm judy woodruff and welcome to the pbs newshour special uninterrupted coverage of the final presidential debate of this 2020 election. in just a few moments president donald trump and former vice president joe biden will be on stage at the curb event center

in bell month university in nashville, tennessee. just this week the debate commission made a change in the debate rules. one candidate's microphone will now be muted while his opponent delivers an initial two minute long answer at the start of each of six topic segments. the topics tonight chosen by the moderator are: fighting covid-19. american families. race in america. climate change. national security. and leadership. the final debate has in the past focused on foreign policy, and the trump campaign complained about the changes made as a result of the cancelation of the second debate which the commission decided would have to be done virtually. this debate on the latest kal ender date in recent his it tree comes as the coronavirus infection rate is again rising across the united states. and after the president himself contracted the virus three weeks

ago. this matchup comes as early voting continues and at an historic pace in all 50 states with more than 47 million americans having already voted. tonight's moderator is kristen welker of nbc news. to her in a moment but joining me tonight for our special coverage are pbs newshour white house correspondent yamiche alcindor. congressional correspondent lisa desjardins who is covering the biden campaign, foreign affairs and defense correspondent nick schifrin and senior national correspondent amna nawaz will be watching the debate along with several voters lunked in virtually from around the country. plus amy walter of the cook "politico" report, along with "washington post" contributing columnist gary abernathy in ohio, and sinned yait-- syndicated columnist cynthia tucker in alabama. welcome to all of you, we are so glad to have y where us. in the little bit of time we have before we go to the debate,

yamish alcindor what is it that the president hopes to accomplish tonight. >> we can expect another all-out brawl, he will be acusing joe biden many, many times of corruption through his son hunter biden. the president will also be vigorously defending his response to the coronavirus as well as attacking the moderator which he has already started to do >> and alyssa desjardins quickly the bietden campaign-- biden campaign in a few seconds, their goal. >> they want to make this about president trump's record. >> we are cutting you short in order to goto moderator kristen welker, she is on stage. she is about to introduce the candidates. president trump and joe biden. >> welker: good evening from bell month university in nashville, tennessee. i'm kristen welker of nbc news and i welcome you to the final 2020 presidential debate between

president donald j. trump and former vice president joe biden. tonight's debate is sponsored by the commission on presidential debates. st conducted under health and safety protocols designed by the commission's health security advisor. the audience here in the hall has promised to remain silent. no cheers, boos or other interruptions except right now as we welcome to the stage former vice president joe biden and president donald j. trump. (applause) . >> welker: and i do want to say a very good evening to both of you. this debate will cover six major topics. at the beginning of each section each candidate will have two

minutes uninterrupted to answer. my first question, the debate commission will then turn on their microphone only when it is their turn to answer. and the commission will turn it off exactly when the two minutes have expired. after that both microphones will remain on but on behalf of the voters i'm going to ask you to please keep one at a time. the goal is for yoto hear each other and for the american people to hear every word of what you both have to say. and so with that, if you are ready, let's start. and we will begin with the fight against the coronavirus. president trump, the first question is for you. the country is heading into a dangerous new phase. more than 40,000 americans are in the hospital tonight with covid, including record numbers here in tennessee. and since the two of you last shared a stage, 16,000 americans have died from covid. so please be specific. how would you lead the country during this next stage of the coronavirus crisis. two minutes uninterrupted. >> so as you know, 2.2 million

people, modeled out were expected to die. we closed up the greatest economy in the world in order to fight this horrible disease that came from china. it is a worldwide pandemic. it's all over the world. you see the spikes in europe and many other places right now. if you noticed, the mortality rate is down 85%. the excess mortality rate is way down and much lower than almost any other country. and we're fighting it and we're fighting it hard. there is a spike. there was a spike in florida, and it's now gone. there was a very big spike in texas, it's now gone. there was a very big spike in arizona, it's now gone. and there were some spikesand surges in other places. they will soon be gone. we have a vaccine that's coming. it's ready. it's going to be announced within weeks. and it's going to be delivered. we have operation warp speed which is the, the military is going to distribute the vaccine. i can tell you from personal experience that, i was in the

hospital. i had it. and i got better. and i will tell you that i had something that they gave me, therapeutic, i guess they would call it, some people would say it was a cure but i was in for a short period of time and i got better very fast or i wouldn't be here tonight. and now they say i'm immune, whether in four months or a lifetime, nobody has been able to say that, but i'm immune. more and more people are getting better. we have a problem that is a worldwide problem. this is a worldwide problem. but i have been congratulated by the heads of many countries on what we have been able to do with the, if you take a look at what we have done in terms of goggles and masks and gowns and everything else, and in particular ventilators. we are now making ventilators all over the world. thousands and thousands a month, distributing them all over the world. it will go away. and as i say, we're rounding the turn, we're rounding the corner. it's going away. >> welker: okay, former vice president biden, to you, how

would you lead the country out of this crisis, you have two minutes uninterrupted. >> 220,000 americans dead. if you hear nothing else i say tonight to this, anyone who is responsible for not taking control, in fact, not saying, i take no responsibility i snishall anyone who is responsible for that many deaths should not remain as president of the united states of america. we're in a situation where there are thousand a thousand deaths a day now. a thousand deaths a day. and there are over 70,000 new cases per day. compared to what is going on in europe as the new england medical journal said, they're starting from a very low rate. we're starting from a very high rate. the expectation is we'll have another 200,000 americans dead between now and the end of the year. we just wore these masks, the president's own advisor told

him, we could save 100,000 lives. and we're in a circumstances where the president thus far still has no plan. no exensive plan. what i would do is make sure we have everyone encouraged to wear a mask all the time. i would make sure we move in the direction of rapid testing, investing in rapid testing. i would make sure that we set up national standards of how to open up schools and open up businesses so they can be safe and give them the wherewithal, the financial resources to be able to do that. we're in a situation now where the new england medical journal, one of the most serious journals in the whole world said for the first time ever that the way this president has responded to this crisis has been absolutely tragic. and so folks, i will take care of this. i will end this. i will make sure we have a plan. >> welker: president trump, i would like to followup with you and your comments. you talked about taking a therapeutic. i assume you are referencing

regeneron, you also said a vaccine will be coming within weeks. >> yes. >> welker: is that a guarantee. >> no, it is not a guarantee, but it will be by the end of the year, but i think it has a good chance, two companies i think within a matter of weeks and it will be drubted very quickly. >> welker: you can tell whi john. >> johnson & johnson, modern is doing well, pfizer is doing very well, and we have numerous others. then we also have others that we are working on very closely with other countries in particular, europe. >> welker: let me followup with you because this is new information. you have said a vaccine is coming soon, within weeks now, your own officials say it could take well into 2021, for the earliest for enough americans to get vaccinated and even then they say the country will be wearing masks and does tansing into 2022, is your time line realistic. >> i think my time line will be more accurate, i don't know that they are counting on the military the way i do. we have our generals lined up, one in particular that is the head of logistics. and this is a very easy distribution for him, he is ready to go as soon as we have

the vaccine, we expect to have a hundred million viels. as soon as we have the vaccine, he's ready to go. >> welker: vice president biden, your reaction, and just 40% of americans say they would definitely agree to take the coronavirus vaccine if it was approved by the government. what steps would you take to give americans confidence in a vaccine if it were approved. >> make sure it is totally transparent. have the science, we'll see it, know it, look at it, go through all the processes. and by the way, this is the same fellow who told you this is going to end by easter last time. this is the same fella who told you that don't worry, we're going to end this by the summer. we are about to go into a dark winter. a dark winter. and he has no clear plan and there's no prospect that there is going to be a vaccine available for the majority of the american people before the middle of next year. >> welker: president trump, your reaction, he says you have in plan. >> i don't think we will have a dark winter at all. we are opening up our country, we have learned and studied and understand the disease which we didn't at the beginning. when i closed and banned china from coming in, heavily

infected, and then ultimately europe, but china was in january, months later he was saying i was xenophobic. i did it too soon. you now he is saying oh, i should have, you know, moved quick are. but he didn't move quicker. he was months behind me. many months behind me. and frankly, he ran the h1n1 swine flu and it was a total disaster, far less lethal but it was a total disaster. had that had this kind of numbers, 700,000 would be dead right now. but it is a far less leltal-- lethal disease. look, his own person who ran that for him, who as you know was his chief of staff, said it was catastrophic. it was horrible. we didn't know what we were doing. now he comes up and he tells us how to do this. also everything that he said about the way every single move that he said we should make, that is what we have done. we have done all of it. but he was way behind us.

>> welker: vice president biden, your response. >> my response is he is xenophobic but not because he shut down access from china. and he did it late, after 40 countries had already done that. in addition to that, what he did, he made sure that we had 44 people that were in there, in china trying to get to wuhan to determine what exactly the source was. what did the president say in january. he sd no, he said this is-- he was being transparent. the president of cheuna is blg transparent, we owe him a debt of gratitude. we have to thank him. and then what happened was we started talking about using the defense act to make sure we go out and get whatever is needed out there to protect people. and again, i go back to this, he has-- nothing he did virtually, nothing, and then he gets out of the hospital and he talks about this is, don't worry. it's all going to be over soon. come on! there's not another serious scientist in the world who thinks it is going to be over soon. >> welker: president trump. >> i didn't say over soon, i said we are learning to live it

with it, we can't lo ourselves up in a basement like joe does. he has the ability to lock himself up. i don't know, he has obviously made a lot of money some place. but he has this thing about living in a basement. people can't do that. by the way, i asthe president codn't do that. i would love to put myself in the basement or in a beautiful room in the white house, and go away for a year and a half until it disappears. i can't do that. and kristen, every meeting i have, and i meet a lot of families including gold star families and military families, every meeting i had, and i had to meet em, i had to, would be horrible to have cancelled everything. i said you know, this is dangerous. and you catch it. and you know, i caught it i learned a lot. i learned a lot. great doctors, great hospitals. and now i recovered. 99.9 of young people recover. 99 percent of people recover. we have to recover. we can't close up our nation. we have to open our schools and we can't close up our nation, or

you're not going to have a nation. >> welker: an of course the cdc has said young people can get sick with covid-19 and can pass it. vice president biden, i want to talk broadly about strategy. >> may i respond to that. >> welker: 30 seconds. >> number one, he says that we're learning to live with it. people are learning to die with it. you folks home will have an empty chair at the kich be table this morning, that man or wife going to bed tonight and reaching over to try an touch thawr, out of habit where their wife or husband was is gone. learning to live with it, come on. we're dying with it. because he has never said, he never said it is dangerous. when is the last time, is it really dangerous still? you tell the people it's dang rao-- dng rouse now, what should we do about the dangerment and you say i take no responsibility. >> welker: let me talk about. >> excuse me, i take full responsibility. it's a not my fault that it came here. it's china's fault. and you know what, it's not joe's fault that it came here either. it's ina's fault.

they kept it from going into the rest of china for the most part but they didn't keep it from coming out to the world including europe and ourselves. >> welker: vice president biden. >> the fact is that when we knew it was coming, when it hit, what happened? what did the president say? he said don't worry. it's going to go away. be gone by easter. don't worry. the warm weather, don't worry, maybe inject bleach, he said he was kidding when he said that, but a lot of people thought it was serious. a whole range of things the president has said even today he thinks we are in control. we're about to lose 200,000 more people. >> welker: president trump. >> look, perhaps just to finish this, i was kidding on that, but just to funnish this, when i closed, he said i shouldn't have closed. and that went on for months. nancy pelosi said the same thing. she was dancing on the streets in chinatown and san francisco. but when i closed, he said this is a terrible thing, you are xenophobe you can. i think he called me racist, even, because i was closing it

to china. now he says i should have closed it earlier. joe, it doesn't work. >> i didn't say oort either of those things. >> you certainly did. >> i talked about xenophobia in a different context it wasn't about closing the border to chinese coming to the united states. >> welker: all right, want to talk about both of your different strategies. >> he thought i shouldn't have closed the border. that is obvious. >> welker: do you want to respond to that ickly, vice president biden. >> no. >> welker: let's talk about your different strategies toward dealing with this. mr. vice president you suggested you would support new shut downs if scientists recommendeit. what do you say to americans who are fearful the cost of shutdowns, the impact on the economy, the higher risk of hunger, depression, domestic and substance abuse outweighs the risk of exposure to the virus. >> what i would say is i will shut down the virus, not the country it is his inep teud that caused the country to have to shut down in large part, why businesses have gone under, why schools are closed, why so man people have lost their living, and why they are concerned. those other concerns are real.

that is why he should have been instead of in a sand trp in his golf course he should have been nshting with nancy pelosi and the democrats and republicans about what to do about the acts they were passing for billions of dollars to mawk sure people had the capacity. >> welker: you haven't ruled out more shutdowns? >> well, no, i'm not shutting down today but look, we need standards. the standard is if you have a reproduction rate in a community that is above a certain level, everybody says slow up. more social distancing. do not open bars and do not open gymnasiums. do not open until you get this under control, under more control. but when you do open, give the people the capacity to be able to open and have the capacity to do it safely. for example, schools. schools, they need a lot of money to open. they need to deal with ventilation systems, they need to deal with smaller classes, more teachers, more pods. he refused to support that money, or at least up to now. >> welker: let's talk about schools. >> i think we have to respond, do you mind. >> welker: mees please ani

have i a followup. >> thank you, i appreciate that. all he does st talk about shutdowns. but forget about him. his democrat governors cuomo in new york, you look at what is going on in california, you look at pennsylvania, north carolina, democrats, mocrats all, they are shut down so tight and they're dying. they're dying. and he supports all these people. all he talks about is shutdowns, no, we're not going to shut down. and we have to open our schools. and as an example, i have a young son, he also tested positive. by the time i spoke to the doctor the second time he was fine. it just went away. young people, i guess it's their immune system. >> welker: let me follow up with you, president trump, you demanded schools open in person and insist they can do it safely but yesterday boston became the latest system to move its public school system entirely online after coronavirus spiked. what is your message to parents who worry that sending their children to school will endanger not only their kids but also their teachers and families. >> i want to ep o the schools. the transmittal rate to the

teachers is very small. but i want to open the schools. we have to open our country. we're not going to have a dri country, you can't do this. we can't keep this country closed. this is a massive country, with a massive economy. people are losing their jobs. they're committing suicide. there's depression, alcohol, drugs at a level that nobody has ever seen before. there's abuse, tremendous abuse. we have to open our country. you know, i've said it often. the cure cannot be worse than the problem itself. and that's what is happening. and he wants to close down, he will close down the country if one person iour massive bureaucracy says we should close it down. >> welker: vice president biden your response. >> simply not true, we ought to be able to walk and chew gum at the same time. we ought to be able to safely open, and they need resources to open. you theed to be able to, for example, if you are going to open a business, have social distancing in the business. you need to have, if you have a restaurant, you need to have

plexiglass providers so people cannot infect one another. you need to be in a position where you can take testing rapidly and know whether a person is, in fact, infected. you need to be able to trace. you need to be able to provide all the resources that are needed to do this. and that is not inconsistent with saying that what we are ing to make sure that we can open safely. and by the way, all you you teachers out there, not that many of you are going to die, so don't worry about it, don't worry about it, come on. >> welker: president trump let me follow up. >> by the way i will say this, if you go and look at what has happened to new york, it is a ghost town. st a ghost town. and when you talk about pliglass, these are restaurants that are dying. the are businesses with no money. putting plexiglass is unbelievably expensive. and it's not the answer. i mean you are going to sit there in a cubic el wrapped around with plastic. these are businesses that are dying, joe. you can't do that to people. you just can't. take a look at new york and what has happened to my wonderful

city. for so many yeared a loved it, it is vibrant it is dying. everyone is leaving new york. >> take a look at what new york has done in terms of turning the curve down in terms of the number of people dying. and i don't look at this in the terms of the way he does. blue states and red states. they are all the united states. and look at thetates that are having such a spike in the coronavirus. they are the red states. they are the states in the midwest, they arthe states in the upper midwest. that is where the spike is occurring significantly. but they are all americans. they are all americans. and what we have to do is say wear these masksk number one. make sure we get the help that the businesses need, that has money already passed to do that. it's been out there since the beginning of the summer, and nothing has happened. >> listen, new york has lost more than 40,000 people, 11,000 people in nursing homes, when you say spike-- talk a look at what is happens ing in pennsylvania. where they've had it closed.

talk a look at what is happening with your friend in mitch much where her husband is the only one allowed to do anything. it has been luke a prison. now it was just ruled unconstitutional. talk a look at north carolina. they're having spikes. an they've been closed an they are getting killed financially. we can't let that happen, joe. you can't let that happen. we have to open up. and we understand the disease. we have to protect our seniors. we have to protect our elderly. we have to protect especially our seniors with heart problems and diabetes problems. and we will protect them. we have the best testing in the world by far. that is why we have so many cases. >> welker: let may follow up with you before we move on to our next section, president trump. this week you called dr. anthony fauci the nation's best infectious disease expert a disaster, an other medical experts as quote idiots. if you are not listening to them, who are you listening to. >> i am listening it all of them including anthony. i do get a lot well with all thonnee but he did say don't wear masks. he did say, as you know, this is

not going to be a problem. i think he say democrat but that is okay. he sawed this is not going to be a problem. we are not going to have a problem at l. when joe says that i said anthony fauci said, and others, and many others, and i'm not knocking him, nobody knew. look, nobody knew what this thing was. nobody knew where it was coming from, what it was. we've learned a lot. but anthony said don't wear a mask. now he wants to wear masks. anthony also said if you look back, exact words, here is his exact words, this is no problem. this will go away soon, so he is allowed to make mistakes. he happens to be a good person. >> welker: your response quickly and we will move on. >> my response is that think about what the president knew in january and didn't tell the american people. he was told this was a serious virus that spread in the air. and it was much worse than, much worse than the flu. he went on record and said tho one of your colleagues, recorded that in fact he knew how dangerous it was you about he didn't want to tell us.

he didn't want to tell us because he didn't want us to panic. the americans don't panic. he pan you wered-- panicked. but guess what, in the mean time we find out in "the new york times" the other day that in fact his folks went to wall street and said this is a really dang wrows-- dangerous thunking and the memo out of that, from some of the broker fell short because we have to get moving it is a dangerous problem. >> welker: i will give you 30 seconds to respond. >> i don't know, somebody went to wall street, you are the one that talks all the money from wall street, i don't take it. you have raised a lot of money. tremendous amounts of money, and every time you raise money, deals are made. i could raise so much more money. as president and as somebody that knows most of those people, i could call the heads of wall street, the heads of every company in america. i would blow away every record but i don't want to do that because it puts me in a bad position. and then you bring up wall street? you shouldn't be bringing up wall street because you are the one that talks the money from wall street, not me. i could blow away your record, like you wouldn't believe.

he don't need money, we have plenty of money in fact we beat hillary clinton with a tiny fraction of the money she was able, so don't tell me. >> average contribution, $43. >> welker: we're going to move on to our next section which is national security and i do want to start with the security of our elections and some breaking news from overnight, just last ght intelligence kemption confirmed russia and iran are working to influence this election. both countries have obtained u.s. voter reason straition information, these officials say, and iran sent intimidating messages to florida voters. this question goes to you mr. vice president, what would you do to put an end to this threat. you have two minutes uninterrupted. >> i made it clear and i asked everyone else to take the pledge. i made it clear that any country, no matter who it is that interferes in american elections will pay a price. they will pay a price. it's been overwhelmingly clear, this election. i won't even get into the last one, this election that russia has been involved.

china has been involved to some degree and now we learn that iran is involved. they will pay a price, if i'm elected. they're interferes with american sovereignty, that is what go og-- going on, interferes with american sovereign tee. to the best of my knowledge don't think the president spoke to putin about it, i don't think he said a word, i don't know why he hasn't said a word to putin about it. and i don't know what he has recently said if anything to the iranians. my guess is he would probably be more outspoken with regard to the iranians am but the point is this, folks, we are in a situation where we have foreign companies, countries trying to interfere in the outcome of our election. his own national security advisor told him that what is happening with his buddy, well, i will, his buddy rudy giuliani, he is being used as a russian pawn. he's being fed information that is russian-- that is not true. and then what happens, nothing happens. and then you find out that

everything that is going on here about russia is wanting to make sure that i do not get elected the next president of the united states because they know i know them. and they know me. i don't understand why this president is unwilling to take on putin when he is actually paying bowntees to kill american soldiers in afghanistan. when he is engaged in activities that are trying to destabilize all of nato. you don't know why he doesn't do it, but it's worth asking the question, why isn't that being done. any country that interferes with us will, in fact, pay a price because they are affecting our sovereignty. >> welker: president trump, same question to you, let me ask the question, will you have two minutes to respond, for two elections in a row now there has been substantial interference from foreign adversaries, what would you do in your next term to put an end to it. >> let me respond to the furs part joe got 3.5 million from russia and it came through putin because he was very friendly with the former mayor of moscow.

and it was the mawr of moscow's wife and he got 3.5 million, your family got 3.5 million. and you know some day you will have to explain whdid you get 3.5, i fever got any money from russia. i don't get money from russia. now about your thing last night, i knew all about that. and through john who, john rot cliffe, he said the one thing that is common to both of them, they both want you to lose. because there has been nobody tougher to russia between the sanctions. nobody tougher than me on russia, between the sanctions, between all of what i have done with nato. you foe i have the national owe countries it to put up an extra 130 billion going to 420 billion a year. that is to guard against russia. i sold, while he was selling pillows and sheets, i sold tank busters to ukraine. there has been nobody tougher on russia than donald trump. and i will tell you, they were

so bad they took over the submarine port, you remember that very well. during your term, during you and barack obama, they took over a big part of what should have been ukraine. you handed it to them. but you were getting a lot of money from russia. they were paying you a lot of money. and they probably still are. but now with what came out today, it's even worse. all of the emails, the emails, the horrible emails of the kind of money that you were rawking in, you and your familiment and joe, you were vice president when some of this was happening. and it should have never happened. and i think you owe an explanation to the american people. why is it somebody just had a news conference a little while ago who was essentially supposed to work with you and your family. but what he said was damning. and regardless of me, i think you have to clean it up and talk to the american people, maybe you can do it right now. >> welker vice president biden, you may respond, and thern i do want to follow up on

the election security. >> have i not taken a penny from any foreign source ever in my life. we learned this president paid 50 times the tax in china in a secret bank account with china, does business in chaina. and in fact, is talks about me taking money? i have not taken a single penny from any country whatsoever. ever. number one. number two, this is the president i havreleased all of my tax returns. 22 years, go look at them. 22 years of my tax returns. you have not released a single solitary year of your tax returns. what are you hiding? why are you unwilling. the foreign countries are paying you a lot. russia is paying you lot. china is paying you a lot. and your hotels and all your businesses all around the country. all around the world. and china is building a new road to a golf course you have overseas. so what is going on here? release your tax returns and stop talking about corruption. >> welker: president trump

your response. >> first of all called my accountants, i will release them as soon as i can, i want to do it and show how successful and great the company is. but much more importantly than that, people we saying 750 dollars, i asked them a week agok i said what did i pay? they said sir, you prepaid tens of millions of dollars. i prepaid my tax over the last number of years. tens of millions of dollars. i prepaid because at some point they think it's an estimate, they think i may have to pay tax. so i already premade it. nobody told me that. nobody tells you that, excuse me and it wasn't written whenever they write it, keep talking about $750 which i think say filing fee. but let may just tell you, i prepaid millions and millions of dollars in taxes. number one. number two, you don't make money from china. you do. i don't make money from ukraine, you do. i don't make money from russia. you made 3.5 million, joe. and your son gave you, they even

have a statement that we have to give 10% to the big man, are you the big man, i think. i don't know, maybe you're not. but you are the big man, i think. your son said we have to give 10% to the big man. joe, what is that all about? it's terrible. >> welker: gentlemen, i want to ask you about questions. >> i have to respond. >> welker: i will let you both respond quickly. you just said you spoke to you are why accountant about potentially releasing your taxes, did he tell you when you can release them. do you have a deadline for when you will release them to the american people. >> i get treated worse than the tea party get treated because there are a lot of people in there, deep down in the irs they treat me horribly, we made a deal, it was all settedded until i decide to run for president. i get treated very badly by the irs, very unfairly. but we had a deal, as soon as we are completed with a deal i want to release it but i have paid millions and millions of dollars and it is worse than paying. i paid in advance, st called prepaying your taxes. >> welker: i want to ask you both about questions regarding

your potential foreign endang-- entanglements and questions, to give you both a chance to talk about it more broadly. respond yuckly and then i will get to my question. >> he has been saying this for four years, show us. just show us. stop playing around. you have been saying for four years you will release your taxes. nobody knows mr. president. what they do know is you are not paying your taxes or you are paying taxes that are so low. when last time he said what he paid, he said i only pay that little because i'm smart. i know how to game the system. come on. come on. >> welker: president trump, thern i want to get to two questions to both of you. >> i was put through a phoney witch-hunt for three years, it started before i even got elected. they spied on my campaign. no president should ev have to go through what i went through. let me just say this. mueller and 18 angry democrats and fbi agents all over the

place spent $48 million. they went through everything i had including my tax returnses. and they found absolutely no collusion and nothing wrong. 48 million. i guarantee you if i spent one million on you, joe, i could find plenty wrong because the kind of things that you have done and the kind of moneys that your family has taken. i mean your brother made money in iraq. millions of dollars. your otr brother made a fortune and it's all through you, joe. and they say you get some of it and do you live very well. you have houses all over the place. you live very well. >> welker: all right, gentlemen, let me ask questions about this broadly. vice president beuden there have been questions about the work your son has done china and you krawnian energy company when were you vice president, in retrospect was anything about those relationships inappropriator unethical. >> nothing was unethical, here is the deal. with regarding ukraine, we had this whole question about whether or not because he was on the board, i later learned of

burisma, a company that show i had done something wrong. yet every single solitary fern when he was going through his impeachment, testifying under oath who worked for him said i did my job impeckically-- impeccably. i carried out u.s. policy. not one single, solitary thing was out of line. not a single thing, number one. number two, the guy who got in trouble in ukraine was this guy trying to bribe the ukrainian government to say something negative about me, which they would not do, and did not do, because it never, ever, ever happened. my son has not made money in terms of this thing about, what are you talking about, china. i have not had-- the only guy who made money from china is this guy. the only one. nobody else has made money from cheuna. >> welker: president trump, let me, pi question to you. >> just one secretary. >> his son didn't have a job for a long time, was sadly no longer in the military service.

i won't get into that. and he didn't have a job. as soon as he became vice president burisma, not the best-- not the best reputation in the world, i hear they paid him $18 3,000 a month. listen to this, 183, and they gave hum a $3 million up front payment. and he had no energy-- that is 100 percent-- . >> welker: i. >> with. >> no bases for that, nobody said anything he did was wrong in ukraine. >> welker: president trump, this is for you, since you took office you have never divested from your business, you personally promoted your properties abroad. a report this week which was referenced does indicate that your company has a bank account in china. so how can voters know that you don't have any foreign conflict of interest? >> i have many bank accounts and they are all lessed and they are all over the place. i mean i was a business man doing business. the banker account you are referring to which is, everybody knows about it, is listed. the banker account was in 2013.

that is when it was. it was opened. it was closed in 2015, i believe. and then i decided because i was going to do, i was think being doing a deal in china like millions of other people. i was thinking about it and i decided i'm not going to do t didn't like it, i decided not to do it had an account open then i closed it. excuse me. and then unlike him, where he ask vice president and he gus business, i then decided to run for president after that. that was of about. so i closed it before i even ran for president, let alone became president. big difference. he is the vice president of the united states, and his son, his brother and his other brother are getting rich. they're like a vacuum cleaning sucking up money any place he goes. >> not true. >> welker: we need to move on. i want to ask you vice president biden about china. let's talk about china more broadly. there have, of course, president trump has said that they should pay for not being fully transparent in regards to the

coronavirus. if you were president, would you make china pay. and please be specific, what would that look like. >> what i would make china do play by the international rules. not like he has done. he has caused the deficit with china to go up, not down. with china. up, not down. we are making sure that in order to do business in china you have to give all your intellectual property, you have to have a partner in china, 51%. we would not do that at all, number one. number two, we in a situation where china would have to play by the rules internationalicall as well. when i met with xu and when i was still vice president he said we're settng up air identification zones in the south cheuna sea, you can't fly through them, i said we are going to fly through them, we just flew b1 bombers through t. >> you have to play by the rules, what does he do, he embraces guys, thugs like in north korea and the chinese president and putin and others.

and he pokes his finger in te eye of all of our frinsk all of our allies. we make up, we are 25%, 25% of the world's economy. we need to be having the rest of our friends with us saying to china, these are the rules. you play by them or you will pay the price for not playing by them, economicically. that is the way i will run it and that is what we did in upholding steel tariffs and a range of other things when we were president and advice president. >> i have to respond to that. >> welker: okay quukly. >> you walked out with aw billion and a half dollars from china. >> not true. >> after spending ten moneys in office and being on our force two, number one. number two, there is a very strong, mail talking about your family wanting to mawk $10 million a year por introductions. >> welker: president trump, on cheuna policy though-- what are you going to do, what specifically are you going to do to mawk china pay, you said you are going to pay. >> first china is paying, billions and billions of

dollars. >> welker: new sanctions. >> i just gave $28 billion to our farmers. >> taxpayers money. >> what. >> ta that is tax pay are money. >> you know who the taxpayer money is china. >> not true. >> cheuna paid $28 million, you know what they did, they deval ud thawr krnsee and also paid up. you know who got the money, our great farmers because they were targeted. you never charged them anything. also, i charged them 25% on dumped steel because they were killing our steel industry. we were not going to have a steel industry and now we have a steel industry. >> welker: okay, vice president bied en, your response. >> my response is, there is a reason why he's bringing up all this malarkey. there is a reason for it. he doesn't want to talk about the substantive issue. st not about his family and my family, it is about your family, and your family is hurting badly. if you are mawking less than-- if you are a middle class family, you are getting hurt badly right now. are you sitting at the kitchen tablthis morning deciding well

we can't get new tires because we have to wait another month or so or are we able to pay the mortgage or who will tell her she can't go back to community college. they're the decisions you are making in the mdle class families like i grew newspaper in scranton and clay ddz mont. they are in trouble. we should be talking about your families but that is the last thing he wants to talk about. >> that say typical statement-- excuse me, one second. >> that say typical political statement, let's get off this china thing and then the family, around t table, everything. just a typical politician, when i see that. i'm in the a typical politician. that is why i got elected. let's get off the subject of cheuna let's talk around sitting around the table. come on joe, you can do better. >> welker: we're going to talk about north korea, president trump you have met with kim jung-un three times. you talked about your beautiful letters with him, you have touted the fact that there hasn't been a war on long-range missile test and north korea recently rolled out its biggest ever intercontinental ballist missile and continues to develop

its nubbing clear arsenal. do you see that as a betrayal of the relationship. just 30 seconds. >> no, when i met with barack obama we sat in the white house. right at the gunning. had a great conversation, was supposed to be 15 moneys and it was well over an hour. he said the biggest problem we have is north korea. he indicated we will be in a war with north korea, guess what. it would be a nuclear war. and he does have plenty of nuclear cap paibility. in the mean time i have a very good relationship with him. different kind of a guy but he probably thinks the same thing about me. we have a different kind of a relationship. we have a very good relationship. and there is no war. and you know, about two months ago he broke into a certain area, they said oh there is going to be trouble. i said no, there not, because he's not going to do that, and i was right. instead of being in a war where millions of people, seoul you know is 25 miles away, millions and millions, 32 million people in seoul, millions of people would be dead right now. we don't have a war and have i a good relationship. >> welker: vieses president

biden, north korea conducted four nuclear tests under the obama administration. why do you think you would be able to reign in this persistent threat. >> because i would make it clear as we make clear to china they have to be part of the deal. i made it clear and as a spokesperson,-- i went to china and said why are you moving your missile defense up so close. why are you moving more forces here, why do you continue to do military maneuvers with south korea. i said because north korea is a problem. and we're going to continue to do it so we can control them. we're going to make sure we can control them and make sure they cannot hurt us. and so if you want to do something about it, step up and help. if not it's going to continue. what has he done? he has legitimized north korea, he talked about his good buddy who is a thug, a thug and he talks about how we're better off and they have much more cap able-- capable missiles, able to reach u.s. territory much more easily than they ever did before. >> let mee follow up with you vice president biden.

you said you wouldn't meet with kim jung-un without preconditions. are there any conditions under which you would meet with him. >> on the condition that he would agree that he would be drawing down his nuclear capacity, to get the korean peninsulshould be a nuclear free zone. >> welker: let's move on to american families. >> they tried to meet with him. he wouldn't do it. he didn't like obama. he didn't like him. he wouldn't do it. they tried. >> welker: 10 seconds to respond to that. >> it's okay, north korea, we are not in a war, we have a good relationship. you know, having a good relationship with leaders of other countries is a good thing. >> welker: we have a lot of questions to get to. >> we had a good relationship with hitler before he in fact invaded europe. the rest of europe. come on. the reason he would not meet with president obama is because president obama said we're going to talk about denuclearization. we're not going to legitimize you, we will continue to put strong stronger and stronger

sanctions on you, that is why he didn't meet with you. >> and it didn't happen. >> welker: let's move on. >> he left me a mess, kristen they left me a mess. north korea was a mess. >> welker: we need to move on. >> do you rememr the first two or three months, there was a very dangerous period in my first three months before we sort of worked things out a little bit. they left us a mess. and obama would be, i think, the first to say it was a single biggest problem. he thought that our country-- . >> welker: let's move on to american families and the economy. one of the issues that is most important to them is health care. as you both know. today there was a key vote and a new preem court justice amy coney barrett and health care is at the nter of her confirmation fight. over 20 million americans get their health insurance through the affordable care ak it is headed to the supreme court and your administration, mr. president, is advocating for the court to overturn it. if the supreme court does overturn that law, there are 20 million americans could lose their health insurance almost

overnight so what would you do if those people have their health insurance it will be better run. but it no longer is obamacare because without the individual mandate, it's much different.

preexisting conditions will always stay. what i would like to do is a much better health care, much better, will always protect people with preexisting. i'd like to terminate obamacare, come up with a brand new, beautiful health care. the democrats will do it because there will be tremendous pressure on them. and we might even have the house at that time, and i think we are going to win the house, okay. you'll see. but i think we're going to win the house. but come up with a better health care, always protecting people with preexisting conditions. and one thing-- very important-- we have 180 million people out there that have great private health care. far more than we're talking about with obamacare. joe biden is going to terminate all of those policies. these are people that love their health care. people that have been successful-- middle-income people-- been successful. they have 180 million plans, 180 million people, families. under what he wants to do-- which will basically be socialized medicine. he won't even have a choice-- they want to terminate 180 million plans.

we have done an incredible job on health care, and we're going to do even better-- >> welker: okay. vice president biden. yes, this is for you. your health care plan calls for building on obamacare. my question is, what is your plan if the law is ruled unconstitutional by the supreme court? you have two minutes uninterrupted. >> what i'm going to do is pass obamacare with a public option, become bidencare. the public option is an option that says if you in fact do not have the wherewithall-- if you qualify for medicate and you do not have the wherewithall in your state to get medicaid you are automatically enrolled providing competition for insurance companies. that's what's going to happen. secondly, we're going to make sure we reduce the premiums and drug prices by making sure there is competition, that doesn't exist now, by allowing medicare to negotiate drug prices with the insurance companies. thirdly, the idea that i want to eliminate private insurance--

the reason why i had such a fight for-- with 20 candidates for the nomination was i support private insurance. that's why i-- not one single person with private insurance would lose their insurance under my plan, nor did they under obamacare. they did not lose their insurance, unless they chose they wanted to go to something else. lastly, we're going to make sure we're in a situation that we actually protect preexisting-- there's no way he can protect preexisting conditions, none, zero. you can't do it in the ether. he's been talking about this for a long time. there is no-- he's never come up with a plan. i guess we're going to get the preexisting condition plan the same time we get the infrastructure plan we have been waiting for since '17, '18, '19, '20. i still have a few more minutes. i know you're getting anxious. the fact is he's already cost the american people because of his terrible handling of the coronavirus and the economic spillover. 10 million people have lost

their private insurance. and he wants to take away 22 million more people who have it under obamacare, and over 110 million people with preexisting conditions. and all the people from covid are going to have preexisting conditions. what are they going to do? >> welker: i have a follow-up for you vice president bieden, itlet ares to something president trump said. he's accusing you of wanting sized medicine. what do you say to people your plan with a public option of course, that it's a health care plan run by the government. >> i say it's ridiculous. the idea-- the fact that there's a public option that people can choose. that makes it a socialist plan? look, the difference between the president-- i think health care is not a privilege. it's a right. everyone should have the right to have affordable health care. and i am very proud of my plan. it's gotten endorsed by all the major labor unions, as well as a whole range of other people who in fact are concerned in the medical field.

this is something that's going to save people's lives, and this is going to give people an opportunity, an opportunity to have health care for their children. how many of you home are worried and rolling around in bed tonight wondering what in god's name you're going to do if you get sick because you lost your home insurance-- your health insurance, your company has gone under. we have provide health insurance for people at an affordable rate, and that's what i'd do. >> welker: president trump, your response. >> he was there for 47 years, he didn't do it. he was there for vice president for eight years. it's not like it was 25 years ago. it was three and three-quarters-- it was just a little while agoing, right, less than fr years ago. he didn't do anything. he didn't do it. he wants socialized medicine. it's not that he wants it-- his vice president, she is more liberal than bernie sanders and wants it even more. bernie sanders wants it. the democrats want it. you're going to have socialized medicine, just like with fracking. "we're not going to have fracking. we're going to stop fracking am.

then he goes to pennsylvania after he got the nomination-- where he got very lucky to get it-- and he goes to pennsylvania and he says, we're going to have fracking. and you never asked that question. by the way, so far, i respect very much the way you're handling this. i have to say. >> by the way-- >> somebody should ask the question. he goes for a year. >> welker: we do have a number-- we have a number of topics we're going to get to. we're going to get to-- >> the same thing with socialized medicine. >> i have to respond. >> welker: vice president your response, please. >> my response is people deserve to have affordable health care period, period, period. and the bidencare proposal will in fact provide for that affordable health care, lower premiums. what we're going to do, it's going to cost some money. it will cost over $750 billion over 10 years to do it. you're going to have lower premiums, buy into the better plans, cheaper plans, lower your premiums, deal with unexpected bilge and have your drug prices drop significantly. he keeps talking about it. he hasn't done thing for anybody on health care. not a thing.

>> kristen when he says-- >> welker: i want to talk about-- >> he's talking about socialized medicine. and health care. whene talks about a public option, he's talking about destroying your medicare, totally destroying and destroying your social security, and this whole country will come down. bernie sanders tried it in his state. he tried it in his state. his governor was a very liberal governor, he wanted to make it work-- >> welker: let's let vice president biden respond. >> he's a very confused guy. he thinks he's running against somebody else. he's running against joe biden. i beat all those other people because i disagreed with them. joe biden he's running against. and the idea we're in a situation that will destroy medicare, this is the guy that the acuary medicare said if in fact-- social security-- if in fact he continues to withhold his plan-- his plan to withhold the tax on social security, social security will be bankrupt by 2023 with no way to make up for it.

this is the guy who has tried to cut medicare. so i don't-- i mean, the idea that donald trump is lecturing me on social security and medicare. come on. >> he tried to get rid of-- >> welker: 10 seconds mr. president. >> years ago, years ago-- go back and look at the records. he tried to hurt social security years ago. >> welker: all right, let's move on, i'm going to move on. mr. president i have to move o to the next question or else we're not going to have time to talk about it. >> if he's elected, the stock market will crash. >> welker: the next question, very quickly. >> look, the idea that the stock market is booming, it's his only measure of what's happening. where i come from in scranton, people don't live off of the stock market. just in the last three-- three years, during this crisis, the billionaires in this country made, according to the wall street, $700 billion more, $700 billion more because that's his

only measure. what happens to the ordinary people out there? what happens to them? >> welker: let's talk about-- >> 401(k)s, kristen. 401(k)s are through the roof. >> welker: we're going to move on. >> he doesn't come from scranton. he lived there for a short period of time before he even knew it and he left displel let me move on my my next question. as of tonight, more than 12 million people are out of work, and as of tonight eight million more americans have fallen into poverty and more families are going hungry every day. those hit hardest are women and people of color. they see washington fighting over a relief bill. mr. president, why haven't you been able to get them the help they need? 30 seconds. >> nancy pelosi doesn't want it. >> welker: you're the president. >> that's one ofthe reasons i think we're going to take over the house because of her. nancy pelosi doesn't want to approve anything because she would love to have victories on a date called november 3.

nancy pelosi does not want to approve it. we are ready, willing, and able to do it. we have approved three plans, including the democrats, in all fairness. this one she doesn't want because she thinks it helps her politically. i think it hurts her politically. >> the republican leader in the united states senate said he can't pass it. he will not be able to pass it. he does not have republican votes. why isn't he talking to his republican friends. >> welker: let me follow up with you, vice president. let me ask vice president biden a question. you are the leader of the democratic party, why haveou not pushed the democrats to get a deal for the american people? >> i have. i have pushed it. they passed this act all the way back in the beginning of the summer. this is not new. it's been out there. this hero's act has been sitting there. and look at what's happening. when i was in charge of the recovery act, with $800 billion, i was able to get $145 billion to local communities that have to their budgets, the states

that have to balance their budgets, and they had to fire firefighters, teachers, first responders, law enforcement officers so they could keep their cities and counties running. he will not support that. they have not done a thing for them. and mitch mcconnell said let them go bankrupt. let them go bankrupt. come on. what's the matter with these guys. >> the bill passed in the house was a bailout of badly run, high-crime democrat, all run by democrats, cities and states. it was a way of getting a lot of money, billis and billions of dollars to these-- it was also a way of getting a lot of money from our people's pockets to people that come into our country illegally. we were going to take care of everything for them. and what that does-- and i'd love to do that. i'd love to help them. what that does, everybody all over the world will start pouring into our country. we can't do it. this was a way of taking care of them. this was a way of spending on things that had nothing to do with covid, as per your question.

but it was really a big bailout for badly run democrat cities and states. >> figet elected-- i'm runningas a proud democrat, but i'm going to be an american president. i don't see red states and blue states. what i see is american, united states. and, folk, every single state out there finds themselveses in trouble, they're going to start laying off, whether they're red or blue, cops, firefighters, first responders, teachers, because they have to balance their been. the founders allowed the federal government to deficit spend for the united states of america. >> welker: i want to talk about the minimum wage. mr. vice president, we are talking about struggling small business and business owners these days. do you think this is the right time to ask them to raise the minimum wage. you support ray $15 minimum wage? >> i do. one of the things we will have to do is bail them out, too. we should be bailing them out now, those small businesses. you have one in six of them going under. they're not going to be able to

make it. they passed a package, called p.p.e., money that is supposed to help them do everything from organize how they can deal with their businesses being open safely, schools, how they can make classrooms smaller, h they can hire more teachers, how they can put ventilation systems in. they need the help, the businesses as well as the schools, need the help. but this-- these guys will not help them. not giving them any of the money. >> welker: we're going to-- to-- >> small businesses by raising the minimum wage? that's not helping. i think it should be a state option. alabama is different from new york, new york is different from vermont. every state is different. it's very important. we have to help our small businesses. >> welker: you said-- >> how are you helping your small businesses when you're forcing wages? what's going to happen and what's been proven to happen is when you do that, these small businesses fire many of their employees. >> welker: you said very recently you would consider

raising the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour. you said recently you would consider raising the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour. is that still the case. in a second administration? >> you know, in a second administration, but not to a level that's going to put all these businesses out of business. it should be a state option. look, different places, i know different places. they're all different. some places-- $15 is not so bad. in other places, other states, $15 would be ruinous. >> welker: president trump. quick response, vice president biden. >> two jobs, one job, below poverty. people are making six, seven, eight bucks an hour. the first responders we all clap for as they come down the street because they allow us to make it. they deserve a minimum wage $15. anything below that puts you below the poverty level. and there is no evidence when you raise the minimum wage businesses go out of business. that is simply not true. >> welker: we're going to talk about immigration. we're going to talk about

immigration now, gentlemen, and we're going to talk about families within this context. mr. president, your administration separated children from their parents at the border, at least 4,000 kids. you've since reversed your zero tolerance policy but the united states can't locate the parents of more than 500 children. how will these families ever be reunited. >> children are brought here by coyotes and lots of bad people-- cartels-- and they're brought here, and they used to use them to get into our country. we now have as strong a border as we've ever had. we're over 400 miles of brand new wall. you see the numbers. and we let people in, but they have to come in legally, and they come in through-- >> welker: but how will you reunite these children wih their family. >> they used to say i built the cages and they had the pictures in a certain newspaper, and it was a picture of these horrible cages and they said look at these cages. president trump built them. and then it was determined they were built in 2014.

that was him. >> welker: do you have a plan to reunite the kids? >> we're working on it very- we're trying very hard. but a lot of these kids come out without their parents. they come out through cartels and coyotes and gangs. >> welker: a quick response and then another question. >> these 500-plus kids came with parents. they separated them at the border to make it a disincentive to come to begin with. real tough. we're really strong. and guess what? they cannot-- it's not coyotes didn't bring them over. their parents were with them. they got separated from their parents, and makes us a laughing stock and violates every notion of who we are as a nation. >> o'donnellnation. >> welker: let me ask you a follow-up question. >> they did it. we changed the policy. who built the cages, joe. >> let's talk about-- >> who built the cages, joe. >> let's talk about what we were talking about. what happened. parents-- the kids were ripped

from their arms and were separated and now they cannot find over 500 sets of those parents, and those kids are alone, nowhere to go, nowhere to go. it's criminal. it's criminal. >> welker: let me-- >> kristen, i will say that, they went down, we brought reporters, everything. they are so well taken care of. they're in facilities that were so clean. >> welker: but some of them haven't been reunited with their families. >> one question. who builthe cages? i'd love you to ask that. >> welker: let me ask you about your administration policy, mr. vice president. obama administration presided over record deportations as well as family detentions before changing force. why should the voters trust you with overhaul now? >> it took too long to get it right. i'll be president of the united states, not vice president of the united states. and the fact is i've made it very clear, within 100 days, i'm going to send to the united

states congress a pathway to citizenship for over 11 million undocumented people. and all of those so-called dreamers, those daca kids, they're going to be immediately rtified again to be able to stay in this country and put on a path to ciizenship. the idea that they are being sent home by this guy, and they want to do that, is they go to a country ey've never seen before. i can imagine, you're five years old, your parents take you across the rio grande river, and it's illegal. and you say oh, no, mom, leave me here. i'm not going to go with you. they've been here. many of them are model citizens. over 20,000 of them are first responders out there taking care of people during this crisis. we owe them. we owe them. >> welker: mr. president. >> he had eight years to do what he said he was going to do. and i've changed-- without having a specific-- we got rid of catch and release. we got rid of a lot of horrible

things that they put in. he had eight years he was vice president. he did nothing except build cages to keep children in. >> welker: vice president biden, your response. >> wrong. the catch and release, you know what he's talking about there? if in fact you had a family, came across, and they were arrested, they in fact were given a date to show up for their family. they were released. and guess what? they showed up for a hearing. and this is the first president in the history of the united states of america anybody seeking asylum has to do it in another country. that's never happened before in america. that's never happened before in america. you come to the united states and you make your case that i seek asylum based on the following premise, why i deserve it, under american law. they're sitting in squalor on the other side of the river. >> welker: president trump, your response. 30 seconds and then we'll move on. >> it just shows he has no understanding of immigration of the laws. catch and release is a disaster.

a murderer would come in. a rapist would come in. a very bad person would come in. we would take their name. we would have to release them into our country, and then you say they come back. less than 1% of the people come back. we have to send ice out. >> not true. >> and border patrol out to find them. we would say come back in two years, three years. we're going to give you a court case. you need perry mason. we're going to give you a court case. when they say they come back, they never come back, joe. they never come back. only the really-- i hate to say this-- but those with the lowest i.q., they might come back. >> welker: let's give vice president biden a chance to respond, and then we'll move on. vice president biden, your response. >> it's simply not true. >> they don't come back. but we don't have to worry about it, because i terminated it. >> and you have 525 kids not knowing where in god's name they're going to be and lost

their parents. >> welker: let's talk about our next section, which is race in america. and i want to talk about the way black and brown americans experience race in this country. part of that experience is something called "the talk." it happens regardless of class and income. parents who feel they have no choice but to prepare their children for the chance that they could be targeted, including by the police, for no reason other than the color of their skin. mr. vice president, in the next two minutes, i want you to speak directly to these families. do you understand w these parents fear for their children? >> you know, i do. i do. you know, my daughter is a social worker. and she's-- she's written a lot about this. she has her graduate degree from the university of pennsylvania in social work. and, you know, one of the reasons why i ended up working on the east side of wilmington, delaware, which is 90% african american was to learn more about what was going on i never had to tell my daughter

if she's pulled over, make sure she puts-- for a traffic stop, put both hands on top of the wheel and don't reach for the glove box because someone may shoot you. but a black parent, no matter how wealthy or how poor they are, has to teach their child, when you're walking down the street, don't have a hoodie on when you go across the street, making sure that you, in fact, if you get pulled over, "yes, sir, no, sir," hand on top of the wheel because you are, in fact, a victim whether you're a person making $300,000-a-year person or meone who is on food stamps. the fact of the matter is there is institutional racism in america. and we have always said-- we've never lived up to it-- we hold these truth to be self-evident. all men and women are created equal. we never lived up to it. we have constantly been moving the needle further and further to inclusion, not exclusion.

this is the first president to come along and say that's the end of that. we're not going to do that anymore. we have to provide for economic opportunity, better education, better health care, better access to schooling, better access to opportunity to barrow money to start businesses. all the things we can do-- and i've laid out a clear plan as to how to do hose things, just to give people a shot. it's about accumulating the ability to have wealth as well as it is to be free from violence. >> welker: president trump, same question to you, and let me remind you of the question. i would like you to speak directly to these families. do you understand why these parents fear for their children? >> yes, i do. and, again, he's been in government 47 years, he never did a thing, except in 1994, when he did such harmo the black community, and they were called, and he called them, super predators, and he said that. he said it. super predators. and they can never live that down. 1994 your crime bill, the super

predators. nobody has done more for the black community than donald trump. and if you look, with the exception of abraham lincoln-- possible exception, but the exception of abraham lincoln-- nobody has done what i've done. criminal justice reform. obama and joe didn't do it. i don't even think they tried because they had no chance at doing it. they might have wanted to do it, but if you had to see the arms i had to twist to get that done, it was not a pretty picture. and everybody knows it, including some very liberal people, that cried in my office. they cried in the oval office. two weeks later they're out saying, gee, we have to defeat him. criminal justice reform, prison reform, opportunity zones with tim scott, a great senator from south carolina, he came in with this incredible idea for opportity zones. it's one of the most successful programs. people don't talk about it. tremendous investment is being made-- biggest beneficiary-- the black and hispanic communities.

and then historically black colleges and universities, after three years of coming to the office, i love some of those guys, they were great. they came into the office, and they said-- i said what are you doing-- after three years i said why do you keep coming back? because we have no funding. i said you don't have to come back every year. we have to come back. because president obama uld never give them long-term funding and i did, 10-year, my response to that is ibutd never, ever said what he accused me of saying. the fact of the matter is, in 2000, after the crime bill had been the law for a while, this is the guy who said the problem with the crime bill is there are

not enough people in jail. there's not enough people in ja. and go on my web site, get the quote, the date, when he said it, not enough people. he talked about marauding gangs, young gangs, and the people who were going to maraud our cities. this is a guy who in the central park five, five innocent black kids, he continued to push for making sure they got the death penalty. none of them were guilty of the crim they were suggested. look, and talk about-- granted, he did, in fact, let 20 people-- he commuted 20 people's sentences. we commute over 1,000 people's sentences, over 1,000. the very law he's talking about is the law that, in fact, initiated by barack obama, and secondly, we're in a situation here where the federal prison system was reduced by 38,000 people under our administration. and one of the things we should be doing, there should be no, no minimum mandatories in the law. that's why i'm offering $20

billion to states to change their state laws to eliminate minimum mandatories and set up drug courts. no one should be going to jail because they have a drug problem. they should go going to rehabilitation, not to jail. we should fundamentally change the system, and that's what i'm going to do. >> whyidn't he do that four years ago? why didn't you do that four years ago, even less than that. you were vice president. you keep talking about all these things you're going to do, and you're going to do this. but you were there just a short time ago, and you guys did nothing. you know, joe, i ran because of you. i ran because of barack obama. because you did a poorjob. if i thought you did a good job, i would have never run. i would have never run. i ran because of you. i'm looking at you now, you're a politician, i ran because of you. >> welker: all right, vice president biden, your response to that, and i do have some questions for both of you. >> i tell you what, i hope he does look at me, because what's happening here. you know who i am. you know who he is.

you know his character. you know my character. you know our reputations for honor and telling the truth. i am anxious to have this race. i am anxious to see this take place. i am-- the character of the country is on will ballot. our character is on the ballot. look at us closely. >> welker: please, respond, and then we're going to have follow-up. >> russia, ukraine, china, other countries, iraq, if this is true, he's a corrupt politician. don't give me the stuff about how you're this innocent baby. joe, they're calling you a corrupt politician. >> nobody is calling me-- >> welker: i want to stay on the issue of race. we're talking about-- president trump-- prident trump-- we're talking about race right now, and i do want to stay on the issue of race. >> i have to respond to that. >> welker: please, quickly. >> there are 50 former national intelligence folks who said that what he accusing me of is a russian plant. they have said this has all the-- five former heads of the c.i.a., both parties, say what he's saying is a bunch of

garbage. nobody believes it except him and his good friend, rudy giuliani. >> you mean the laptop is now another russia, russia, russia, hoax. >> that's exactly what-- that's exactly what-- >> this is where he's going. >thelap top is russia, russia, russia. you have to be kidding. here we go again with russia. >> welker: we're going to continue on the issue of race. you described the black lives movement as a symbol of hate. you said black professional athletes exercising their first amendment rights should be fired. what do you say to americans who say that kind of language from a president is contributing to a climate of hate and racial strife. >> the first time i ever heard of black lives matter, they were chanting, pigs in a blanket-- talking about police-- pig, pigs, pigs in a blanket. fry them like bacon.

i said that was a horrible thing. and they were marching were mare street. and that was my first glimpse of black livers matser. i-- black lives matter. i thought it was a terrible thing. as far as my relationships with all people, i think i have great relationships with all people. i am the least racist person in this room. >> what do you say to americans who are concerned about that rhetoric. >> i don't know what to say. i have got criminal justice reform done and prison reform and opportunity zones, i took care of black colleges and universities. i don't know what to say. they can say anything. i mean they can say anything. it's a very-- it makes me sad because i am, i am the least racist person. i can't even see the audience because it's so dark. but i don't care who is in the audience, i'm the least rist peon in this room. >> welker: vice president bied inlet me ask you quukly. abraham lincoln one of the-- he pours fuel on every

sing em racist fire. every single one, started off his campaign coming down ying he would get rid of those mexican rapists, he banned muslim because they are muslim. he med around and made everything worse across-the-board. he says about the poor boys last time we were on stage here, he told them to stand down and stand ready, come on, this guy is a dog whistle about as big as a foghorn. >> welker: president trump i will give you ten seconds to respond. >> you made a reference to abraham lincoln. where does that come in. >> you said are you abraham lincoln. >> no, no, i said not since abraham lincoln has anybody done what i have done for the black community. >> and i'm saying. >> i didn't say i am abraham lincoln. i said not since abraham lincoln has anybody done what i have done for the black community. now you have done nothing other than the crime bill. which put. >> oh god. >> tens of thousands of black

men, mostly in jail. and you know what, they remember it because if you look at what is happening with the voting right now, they remember that you treated them very, very badly. take a look at what is happening out there. >> welker: vice president biden let me give you a response chance to respond, the crime bill you supported in the 80s and 90s contributed to the incarceration of thousands of black men who had small amounts of drugs in their po stionment they are sons, fathers, brothers, uncles whose families are still to this day suffering the consequence, so speak to those milies, why should they vote for you. >> one of the things is that in the 80s we passed 100%, all 100 senators voted for it, a bill on drug and how tho deal with drugs. it was a mistake am i have been trying to change it since then, particularly the portion on cocaine. that is why i have been arguing that, in fact, we should not send anyone to jail for a pure drug offense.

they should be going into treatment, across-the-board. that is what we should be spending money, that is why i set up drug courts which were never funded by our republican friends. they should not be going to jail for a drug or an alcohol problem. they should be going into treatment, treatment. that is what we have been trying to do. that is what i am going to get done. because the american people have now seen that it was a mistake to pass those laws in the 80s of drugs, but they were not in the crime bill. >> but why didn't you get it done, see st all talk, no action with politics. why didn't you get it done. that is what i am going to do when i become president, you were vice president along with obama as your president, your leader, for eight years, why didn't you get it done? you had eight years to get done. now you are saying you are going to get it done because you are all talk and no action, joe. >> we got a lot of it done. >> you didn't get anything done. >> we got 38,000 prisoners out. >> you got nothing done. >> 38,000 prisoners were released from federal prison.

there were over a thousand people who were given clemency. we are the ones that put in the legislation saying we could look at pattern and practice of the police department and what they were doing. how they were conducting themselve. i could go on. but we began the process. we began the process, we lost an election, that is why i am running, to win back that election and change his terrible policies. >> we will move on. >> why didn't you do in the eight years, a short time okay. why didn't do you it? you just said i'm going to do that, i'm going to do this. you put tenses of thousands of mostly black young men in prison. now you are saying you are going going to undo that, why didn't you get it done. you had eightiers with obama, you know why, joe, because you are all talk and no action. >> vice president bied en, then we move on to the next question. >> because we had a republican congress. >> you have to talk them into, joe, you have to talk them into

it. >> welker: we will move on to our next section. >> liic did in criminal justice reforming i had to talk democrats that it. >> welker: we are running out of time, to climate change please, you both have very dferent visions on climate change. president trump you said environmental regulations have hurt jobs in the energy sector. vice president biden, you have said you would be addressing climate change as an opportunity to create new jobs. for each of you, how would you both combat climate change and support job growth at the same time starting with you, president trump. you have two minutes uninterrupted. >> so is we have the trillion trees program program, we have so many different programs, i do love the veument but i want the cleanest, crystal clear water, the cleanest our. we have the best, lowest number in carbon emissions, which is a big standard that i notice obama goes with all the time, not joe, i haven't heard joe use the term because you i'm not sure he understands what it represents or means but i have heard obama use it. and we have the best carbon

emission numbers we have had in 35 years under this administration. we are working so well with industry. but here is what we can't do. look at china, how filthy it is. look at russia, look at india, it is filthy. the air is filthy. the paris accord, i took us out because we were going to have to spend trillions of dollars and we were treated very unfairly. when they put us in there, they did us a great disservice. they were going to take away our businesses. i will not sacrifice tens of millions of jobs, thousands and thousands of companies because of the paris accord. it was so unfair. china doesn't kick in until 2030. russia goes back to a low standard and we kicked in right away it would have been-- it would have destroyed our businesses, so you ready? we have done an incredible job environmentally. we have the cleanest air, the

cleanest water and the best carbon emission standards than we've seen in many many years. >> vice president biden. >> and we haven't destroyed our industries. >> vice president biden, two moneys to you uninterrupted. >> climate change, climate warming, global warming, is an exi sengs threat to your humanity. we have a moral obligation to deal with it. and we're told by all the leading scien firsts in the world we don't have much time. we're going to pass the point of no return within the nexteight to ten years. four more years of this man eliminating all the regulations that were put in by us to clean up the climate, to clean up, to limit, limited emissions, will put us in a position where we're going to be in real trouble. here is where we have a great opportunity. i was able to get both all the environmental organizations as well as labor, people worried about jobs, to support my climate plan. because what it does, it will create millions of new good

paying jobs. we're going to invest in, for example, 500,000-- excuse me, 50,000 charging stations on our highways so that we can own the electric car market in the future. in the mean time china is doing that. we are going to be in a position where we're going to see to it that we're going to take four million existing billion buildings and two million existing homes and retrofit them so they don't leak as much energy saving hundreds of millions of barrels of oil in the process, and creating significant number of jobs. and by the way, the whole idea of what this is all gling to do, it is going to create millions of jobs. and it's going to clean the environment. our health and our jobs are at stake. that's what is happening. and right now by the way wall street firms indicatedded that my plan, my plan will in fact create 18.6 million jobs, 7 million nor than his. this is from wall street. and i will create one trillion

more in economic growth than his proposal does. not on climate, just on the economy. >> welker: president trump. >> they came out and said strongly 6,500 will be taken away from families under his plan, that his plan is an economic disaster. if you look at what he wants to do, you know, if you look at his-- nothing to do with climate. >> thompson: you know who developed it, aoc plus three. they know nothing about the climate. i mean she is real estate got a good line of stuff but she nose nothing about the climate. and they are all hopping through hoops for aoc plus three. their real plan costs a hundred trillion dollars. if we had the best year in the history of our country for a hundred years we would not even come close to a number like that. when he says buildings, they want to take buildings down because they want to make bigger windows into smaller windows. as far as they are concerned, if you had no window it would be a lovely thing. this is the craziest plan that

anybody has ever seen. and this wasn't done by smart people. this wasn't done by anybody, frankly, i don't even know how it can be good politically. they want to spend a hundred trillion, that is their real number, he is trying to say it was six, a hundred trillion dollars. they want to knock down buildings and build new buildings buildings with little tiny, small windows and many other things and many other things. >> welker: let me ha the vice president to respond. we are rung out of time and have a lot more questions. let's hear from the vice president. >> i don't know where he comes from. i don't know where he comes up with these numbers. a hundred trillion dollars, give me a break. this plan was-- this plan is endorsed by every major, every major environmental group and every labor group, labor. because they know that future lies, the future lies in us being able to breae and they know there are good jobs in getting us there. and by the way, the fastest growing industry in america are, is the electric, excuse me, so

the ar energy and wind. he thinks wind causes cancer, windmills it is the fastest growing jobs. and they pay good prevailing wages. 45, 50 bucks an hour. we can grow and we can be cleaner if we go the route i'm proposing. >> welker: president trump respond and then have i to follow up. >> we are energy independent for the first time. we don't feed all of these countries that we had to fight a war over because we needed their energy. we are energy independent. i know more about wind than you do. it is extremely expensive. it kills all the burdens. it is very intermit ent. got a lot of problems. and they happen to make the windmills in both germany and china. and the fumes coming, if you are a believer in carbon emission, the fumes coming up to make these massive windmills is more than anything that we're talking about with natural gas, which is very clean. >> if i may. >> solar, i love solar but solar doesn't quite have it yet. it is not powerful yetto

really run our big beautiful factories that we need to compete with the world. so. >> false. >> it's all a pipedream, but you know what we will do. we are going to have the greatest economy in the world but if you want to kill the economy, get rid of your oil industry. you want-- and what about fracking. now, now we have sto ask about-- . >> welker: let me allow vice president bied into respond. >> i never said i oppose fracking. >> you said it on tape. >> show the tape, put it on your website. >> i will put it on. >> put it on the website. the fact of the matter is you flat lined. >> welker: would you rule out banning fracking. >> i do rule out banning fracking. because the answer, we need, we need other industries to transition, to get to ultimately a complete zero emissions by 2025. but what i will do with fracking over time is make stheur that we can capture the emissions from the fracking. capture the emissions from gas. we can do that and we can do that by investing money in doing

it. but st a transition to that. >> welker: i have one more question and then we have. >> he was against fracking. he said it, i will show that to you tomorrow. >> good. >> welker: i am against fracking, until he got the nomination, went to pennsylvania, then he said but you know what, pennsylvania, he will be against it very soon because his party is totally against it. >> frack on federal land, i said, no fracking for oil on federal land. >> welker: let me ask this final question in this section and then i want to move on to our final question. president trump people of color are much more likely to live near oil referies and chemical plants. in texas there are families who worry the plants near them are making them sick. your administration has rolled back regulations on these kinds of fa siltds. why should these family give you another four years in office. >> the families that we are talking about are employed heavily and are making a lot of money, more money than they have ever made. if you look at the kind of numbers that we produce for hispanic or black or asianit is nine times greater, the

percentage gained than it was under, in three years than it was under eight years of the two of them, to put it nicely. neun times more. now somebody lives, have i not heard the numbers or the statistics that you are saying. but they're making a tremendous amount of money economicically. we saved it and i suaved it again a number of months ago when oil was crashing because of the pandemic. we suaved it. we got, say what you want about relationship. we got saudi arabia, mexico and russia to cut back, way back. we saved our oil industry and now it's very veub rant. and everybody has very inexpensive gasoline, remember that. >> welker: vice president biden your response and then a final question for both of you. >> may response is that those people live on what they call fenclines. he doesn't undetand this. they live near chemical plants that in fact pollute chemical plants and oil plants and refineries that pollute. i used to lip near that when i was growing up in claymont del

aware and the oil refineries, in the delaware river than there is any place including in houston at the actual. when my mom would get in the car with the first frost to drive me to school, there would be an oil sluk on the window, that is why so many people in my state were dying and getting cancer. the fact is those front line communities, it doesn't matter what you are paying them, it matters how you keep them safe. what do you do, and you don't you impose restrictions on poll-- pollutants coming out of those fence line communities. >> would he close down the oil industry, would you close down the oil industry. >> i would transition fm the oil industry, yes, i would transition. >> that say bug statement. >> st a big statement because i would stop-- . >> welker: why would you do that. >> because the oil industry pollutes significantly. >> i see. >> here is the deal. >> if youet may finish the stawment, because it has to be replaced by renewableenergy, over time. over time. and i stop giving to the oil

industry, i would stop giving them federal subsidies. he won't guff federal subsidies to the gas-- to solar, and wind, why are we giving it to oil industry. >> we do give it to solar and wund and that is maybe the buggest statement in terms of business, that is the biggest statement because basically at he is saying is he is going to destroy-- the oil industry. would you remember that, texas, will you remember that pennsylvania, oklahoma. >> welker: vice president biden let me give you ten secretaries to respond. >> he takes everything out of context. but the point is we have to move toward a net zero he moition-- emissions. the first place to do that by the year 2035 is in energy reduction, by 2050 totally. >> is he going to get china to do that. is he going to get china to do it. >> welker: let's move on to the. >> no, i will regain par ace cord and make china abide by what they agreed to. >> welker: this is about leadership, gentlemen.m and this first question does go

to you, president trump. imagine this is your inauguration day. what will you say in your address to america, to americans who did not vote for you. you will each have one minute starting with you. >> we have to make our country totally successful as it was prior to the plague coming in from china. now we are rebuilding it and doing record numbers 11.4 until in a short period of time et cetera. but i will tell you, go back, before the plague came in, just before, i was getting calls from people that were not normally people that would call me. they wanted to get together. we had the best black unemployment numbers in the hiory of our country. hispanic, women, asian, people with diplomas, with no diplomas, mut graduates, number one in the class, everybody has the best numbers. and you know what, the other side wanted to get together. they wanted to unify. success is going to bring us together. we are on the road to success. but i'm cutting taxes, and he wants to raise everybody's taxe

and he wants to put new regulations on everything. he will kill it, if he gets in, will you have a depression the likes of which you have never seen. your 401(k)s will go to hell. and it will be a very, very sad day for this country. >> all right, vice president biden, same question to you, what will you say during your inaugural address to americans who did t vote for you? >> i will say i am an an american president, i represent all of you whether you voted for me or against me. and i am going to make sure that you are represented. i am going to give you hope, we're going to move, we'll choose science over fiction, we will choose hope over fear, we will choose to move forward because we have enormous opportunity, enormous opportunities to make things better. we can grow this economy, we can deal with the systemic racism, at the same time and make sure our economy is being run and moved and motivated by clean energy, creating millions of new jobs. and that's the fact, that is

what ware going to do. and i'm going to say as i said in the beginning, what is on the ballot here is the character of this country. decency, honor, respect, treating people with dignity, making sure that everyone has an even chance. and i'm going to make sure you get that. you haven't been getting it the last four years. >> welker: all right, i want to thank you both for a very robust hour and a half, a fantastic debate, really appreciate it. president trump, former vice president joe biden, thank you to bell month university for hosting us tonight. and most importantly, thank you to those watching tonight. election day is november 3rd. don't forget to vote. thank you everyone. and have a great night. >> thank you. (applause). >> woodruff: and with that moderator kristen welker who has done a superb job moderating this debate for the last hour and a half thanks the candidates, president trump and joe biden. both of these men landed blows

tonight. we heard them go after each other's character. we heard them go after their position on the issues. but at the same time this was much closer to a real debate than what we saw the last time they were together a few weeks ago. they talked about climate. they talked about immigration. they covered foreign policy. they talked about china. they discussed race in america. they talked about health care. and on. this was a substantive debate. i think a much more valuable debate for the american people than what we heard in the first debate. so i'm judy woodruff, welcome back tthe pbs newshour special korchg of this d bait. i want to go quickly to our reporters, yamiche alcindor, lisa desjardins and nick schifrin, all of them back with me, and nick, you cover foreign affairs, national securitiment i want to come to you first because that came up su pricingly more, i think, than people expected it to. in this debate, china, north korea, iran, and a lot, nick,

about allegations by the president against joe biden and his son hunter. >> yeah, judy, i agree with you, this was a substantive debate. they did get to core disagreements on how they would govern on the future on china. they disagreed on election security, north korea, hopefully we can talk about that, and yes, u are right. they did finally engage also with a descent amount of substance on allegations that republicans and president trump have been waging against hunter biden. so let's take a look at some of this. president trump accused hunter bidebeing part of what he called a corrupt biden family. he cited china, ukrae, russia and iraq. and the core of the vice president's defense is that his son's foreign consulting did not affect his policy through his 30 plus years in washington. and that hunter himself did nothing wrong. and i think we do want to do a little bit of a fact check

quickly on allegations in china. the accusaon by the president 3 and others have been that hunter biden show got 1.5 billion dollars from china. quickly judy, hunter was on a board of a chinese investment firm, that firm had stakes in china-- chinese companies that made camera, that had been actually used in shinjung to crack down on weeingers, had stakes in a company that made chinese military jets. hunter's lawyer said that membership of his, that he had on that board did not pay, and that 1.5 billion was actually a fundraising goal that the investment firm had, not a payment to hunter. and that none of it went to joe biden. >> woodruff: and as we heard joe biden say repeatedly during this debate, none of this is true. it doesn't add up to anything. yamiche alcindor, the president, we saw a president who was, yes, he was forceful but not

interrupting. 150 and 160 times as in the first debate. what did you hear from the president tonight that stood out to you? >> well, judy, as you just noted, president trump was much more controlle much more in a traditional sense, having a debate with joe biden on substantive ises. one of the main issues that came up, of course, is the pandemic and the coronavirus. the president was on the defense. he said at one point that the neutral iterate was dropping and spikes in cases were gone in states like florida and texas and arizona, that is not completely true, it has actually been spiking after the summer. i also want to point out that the president was talking about race and when he was asked physically about what he would say to family members who would talk about their children and warn them about the police, he said i'm the least racist person in the room. and then he went on to talk about all the things he has been doing with other things for african-american communities. >> so yes, they very much covered that subject. and lisa desjardins, to you, joe

biden was on the attack at a number of pownts in the debate but also on the defensive when he was pressed with a question about his record, when it comes to criminal justice reform. and on a number of others, when president trump came after him, on his record, on china. and on china trade. >> that's right, to me both of these men came across as people who had prepared. and i think that in joe biden's case, it seemed like many of the babe approaches he had practiced for months now didn't seem like it was something scripted it seemed to come naturally from him. and i especially noticed with the former vice president he was more direct. he used more simple language, fewer numbers. he is a policy guy but here in taking the example that yamiche brought up on race, what a

contrast between these two me as the presidents with pivotingk didn't address the families of black americans as kristen welker asked him to. instead vice president biden said there is institutional racism in america. and that was his approach to many issues. climate change, that is an existential threat, biden said. and even when he was under attack we also heard a more direct biden on that saying to the president, voters are voting for me. they are not voting for bernie sanders. this nonsense is about me taking medicare is nonsense. that was a more direct biden. ideas he had before but i think the most direct and simple that i have heard him express-- express those ideas. >> woodruff: he made use of the technique in the first deba where he would look at the camera, talk to the american people. and at several points tonight, referring to character being on the ballot. he said that early in this debate and he used the final question from kristen lker

when she asked both of them what they would say if they were elected, to americans who didn't vote for them. joe biden repeating what he had said before about character being on the ballot. i want to bring in our analyst now w are also joining us aim amy walter of the cook political report, also host of public radio's politics with amy walter. gary abernathy is contributing columnist for "the washington post." he joins from cincinnati and cynthia tucker a syndicated columnist and journalist in residence at the university of south alabama. amy, your main take away. >> what a difference a sicked debate makes, right? this was so different than what we had seen of about. but also maybe what we were expecting, you know. the sort of pregaming from the trump side was that the president was going to come in swinging. now he definitely tried to play on the offense but without the interrupting, without talking over the moderator.

he was also a much more disciplined candidate than we have seen in recent times. and he stayed very focused on what he wanted to get across. and namely it was in message. joe biden, you have been there, in washington for almost 50 years. were you in the white house for eight years. why didn't you do all the things you are talking about right now. so i thought that he was much more effective in delivering a message against joe biden than we have even before. imieden himself really only had to come into this and not lose, but he was doing more than just playing prevent defense. he was actually going on the offense too, especially very early on, really putting the president on point, on issues or taking into task, especially on covid and his response and management. covid crisis which, of course, biden painted as being really poor. finally at the end of the day, judy, this has been an incredible year with so much tum ult, so much chaos, so many

things that have happened. and yet opinions about this president have really not changed all that much. the first debate certainly had an impact on the overall gap between biden and trump. biden opened his lead after that first debate. the question now is is a normal did he bait good enough, ten days out for trump to close what is still a historically large deficit for an incumbent president this close to election day. >> and gary abernathy, i'm going to put that question to you, because that is the question on my mind. the president was able to deliver what we call a more traditional debate to participate even though he had some tough very tough moments in this debate. but is it going to help him. does it change the equation in some way? >> i you know judy, and amy's point well taken.

this always raises the question for president who want trump to be successful. what is this was the trump we had all the time. what if this was the trump that showed up at every debate and every press nference and conducted himself in a more quote unquote presidential way. st one of those questions that will always be frustrating because when he does do it he is very effective at it and doesn't distract all these side issues when he gets in his own way and is his own worst enemy. i thought they were both very, very good tonight. i thought they were both prepared. i thought the coronavirus discussion was the most interesting to me of the whole night. i felt like you know, biden in painting a dardark picture may be going too dark sometimes, talking about th dark winter that is ahead of us. and people are learning to die. >> welker: referring to death. >> americans do like optimism, a little more than pessimistic,

but overall i thought it was informative an americans had an opportunity tonight to sit down and really learn about the distinctions between these two candidates and the real winner to me was kristen welker who did a fantastic job. journalism is a winner night, especially compared to the townhall that happened last week, the respective townhalls where i think one was too tough and one was too soft, and kind of like the three bears, this one was just right. >> woodruff: i think we are all in agreement so far that kristen welker did a superb job. cynthia tucker, what about, more about joe biden. you know, everybody seems to be saying he did what he needed to do he didn't hurt himself. what did you hear from him that will stay with you in days to come? >> well, what he gave that i thought was stellar, one was the response he gave to the question

that was asked about black families and the talk. wh he talked about the fact that he never had to tell his children how to respond if you are pulled over by a police officer so you won't get shot. the other answer that i thought was stellar was the final answer. what would you say to people who did not vote for you? and that has always been one o the biggest distinctions between president trump and former vice president joe biden. president trump has spent four years playing to his base, playing to the people who voted for him, his ardent supporters. and joe biden has come into this campaign talking about bringing americans back together. having those, closing the wounds, healing the wounds, that

doesn't mean it was a perfect night for biedern by any means. he stumbled in some places. and i thought president trump landed some effective blows, particularly in talking about the crime bill, biden still is on the defensive about the crime bill which did help massive aid, mass incarceration and i thought the line about, you know, you've been in washington so long, why didn't you accomplish these things before, was effective for the president. but i also thought that the president would have been better off talking about what he plans to do for the american people and not just attacking. >> you are right, even though we heard less attacking than in the last debate there still was a lot of it in this debate, finally i want to turn to our senior national correspondent amna nawaz, she was watching along with a group of american

voters as part of our voice of the voters protect-- project. amna, are you getting a sense at this point of their reaction? >> yeah, judy, i had a quick chance to check in with our six voters joining us from around the country, from oil oy, california, new jersey, south carolina and georgia. quick take away, everybody was sort of impressed with the debate. i think the bar was so low after the last time these two men faced off. these are vote errs who have been engaged and watching and they watched the townhalls. they are keeping up and seeing what the candidates are doing and saying. they walked away were this debate mostly saying they felt informed. many of them already leaning towards one candidate or the other. i don't know yet if anyone changed their mind but they did say they thought this was the best debate so far. i will share one democrat on the panel also said he was astonished by the president's performance in a good way. he thought this was the best and most sort of best performance from president trump so far.

a few other quick take awares. praise all around for the moderator. they thought it was the best moderated debate so far. they also felt that they, talked more about thawr rerd as candidates before and not so much about the future. they iked to focus on the policy and on the issues and e thing i will say about this group of voters who have been with us after each debate including the vice presidential debate, they come from th sides of the aisle. they are very much engaged and they come together every time we gather. and speak civilly, even though they disagree politically, they engage and they talk and they listen and we will be continuing that conversation tonight even more. so i hope people will join us and listen in to what these folks have to say, judy. >> no question. such an important point you made, about expectations. people come into these debates with a certain set of expectations and are you right, the bar was low after the first presidential debate. and just quickly amna, my sense is these voters were already

leaning one way or another. u don't hear them changing their mienld. >>ot yet. i'm definitely going to be asking that question. of the six voter there is one who comes from a background, a republican family who believes is he leaning towards biden. we will see if we can get an answer out of him tonight but a lot more to come with these voters and we will continue that conversation, judy? >> and that, i know we will all be looking frward to that. we have a couple minutes left. i want to come back to our correspondent covering the white house and joe biden. lisa, to you again. where does joe biden go from here? it is his campaign sense he did the what he needed to do tonight, what does he need to do between now and the election? >> this is now a strategic campaign focused on a few states. amy knows them, a lot of our viewers know them, that is what

stood up to me in this debate as well. you heard president trump mention those, he knows or nieds to make up ground or get back to where was in 2016. i think within 20 minutes president trump had mentioned michigan, north carolina. he talked about economic affects there, and then he also took a shot at joe biden and pennsylvania, you might have heard him say bied sen not really from scranton, in fact biden was born in scranton, spent his school years in scranton as a young boy. but that just shows where this battle is. and where biden needs to go. what he needs to do. he needs to focus on those states, pennsylvania, north carolina, high on the list. >> yeah, we noticed that he made a point of mentioning these crucial, crucial states for him, that the president needs to win. in order to win this election. so yamiche, what about the trump campaign what do they neeto do. do they think they need to do between now and voting day? >> i should say the end of voting. >> well, president trump really

feels like he needs to do two thingsk one is continue to defend his response to the coronavirus. hospitalizations are going flup 39 states including in wisconsin, much mitch, ohio the same states that lisa and amy talk about a lot. the president under stands that he needs needs to continue to go those states, we will see him crisscrossing, going to rally after rally, that americans need to move past. this the problem is the facts are not on his side a lot of times and we are seeing a lot of these spikes go into states that he needs to win. another thing to know is the president needs to connect with more americans. justame back from florida and the president there, he really is struggling with in some key areas especially among seniors. a lot of people want to make sure that the president cares about them, he stumbled on that question. when asked how does he care and think about black families. did he not have a personal answer. when he was depending himself on separated quhirn and 500 parents not able to be located. he said still the kids are being treated well. and that right there are the kind of answers that will hurt

him among suburban women and seniors. >> woodruff: and i keep think being his statement that i have been the best president the country has ever had for african-american, for black americans except maybe for abraham lincoln which joe guideen turned around and said abraham lincoln, here has been the most racist president we ever had, one of the more memorable exchanges in the debate. >> we are so grateful to all of you for watching what we said was more of a real debate tonight thanked what we widthnessed three weeks ago when joe biden and donald trump, former vice president biden and president trump met in that first debate. so for now that concludes the pbs fushour special coverage of this debate it is the last one, only about ten days left until election day. i want to thank again our correspondent yamiche alcindor, lisa desjardins, nick schifrin

and of course amna nawaz and our panel amy walter, gary abernathy and cynthia tucker and on the pbs fushour online, our coverage will continue, amna will be talking live with that panel of voters from across the country. the voice of the voters, that starts right now at pbs.org slash newshour, for all of us at the newshour, i'm judy woodruff, thank you, stay safe and good night. >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc

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