of of of hello and welcome. tonight on spotlight, we in break down the first presidential debate between camala harris and donald trump. the highly anticipated face-off saw fears exchanges between the candidates issues like climate change, immigration and foreign policy. while the candidates aim to aril each other, trump supporters may have gotten more red meat, but camala harris earned coveted endorsements from influential figures, so who

came out top to find out and to dissect the debate and analyze the key moments, we are joined by our guests thea west, political commentator from dallas, texas, and also we are joined by mr. george, says muly. senior research fellow at the global policy institute from budapest. thank you very much to both of you, gentlemen. let's begin with our guest from dallas in your opinion, who came out top? well, in this situation, kamla harris, as far as the performance, she performed better now than trump, now she did get help from the the hosts. uh of abc, they

helped her out lot, they cut trump off lot, they did not challenge uh comala harris generally, uh, for example, in the very beginning, one of the first questions was to kamala, uh, is the economy better than it was four years ago, are we better now than we were four years ago? kamla harris refused to answer the question, and the moderators, they did not repeat it, they did not go after her. on that, and this happened throughout the debat, and often also they would cut trump off, they will start with another question, they start with another question, but because of the rules donald trump said, but the moderators. go to another question, so

overall trump did not perform that well in this debate, they helped out lot in this particular debate, the cats andaten infield. that was very, very bad move on his part politically. now you would have uh, let's say maybe 30% of his supporters, they will support all that, but he he lost some of the other voters, some of the independent voters, he would lose them on such comments as that, so that's just one example, but i'll have more to say on that as we go along here, of course we will be discussing all the different. aspects of that debate last night,

but uh, now that we had the opinion of someone from inside the us, let's bring in our guest from budapest as an international observer, mr. siz muly, how do you think the uh continued political division in the us, because for us sitting outside the us, we clearly remember the capital attack, and we do know that there is huge rift in the society uh, as far as the us is concerned. so how do you see those divisions playing a part? well, just to go back to the point made by my colleague, i agree with most of what he said, think in that debate, the two moderators were not in any sense moderators, they were essentially working on the the same team as camela harris, they factcheck. donald

trump repeatedly, they didn't fact check khamela harris once, even though she told uh one lie after another lies that had been already many times, this... proven and and as my colleague pointed out, whenever trump got onto a subject on which he was strong, they would immediately interrupt and move to another subject, the the one part that i didn't agree with my colleague was the issue the the dogs and cats in ohio, because that story will have resonance, people feel very emotional about their... and what what the ultimate truth of that story is we we don't as yet know the point was that the moderators jumped in and said oh this isn't true, well it's not at all clear at this stage whether it is or isn't true, but it's something that will resonate with people, whether they're

you know republicans, democrats, independents, moderates, conservatives, you people who feel strongly about their pets will want to find out what's the truth of this? is it is it the case that there are immigrants um in springfield ohio who are eating uh cats, so that may well be the the most memorable part of the debate. now just to go back to um your question, yeah, there's no question, america is deeply divided, it it is a 50/50 country, so it's looking like this will be the third election in a row that will be decided. by few tens of thousands of votes, as was the 2016 election and the uh 2020 election, and it's going to be decided um a handful of uh states, it's very hard to see how this um division uh can be overcome

um and and and in particular while trump has obviously very ardent um supporters, he has many ardent um opponents on the other side um, same goes for uh carmela harris and i think the if one has a you know a big takeaway from the debate it will be that neither side um will feel that uh that any anything fundamentally has changed those who trump supporters will say yeah trump won and then he's great and camala harris is terrible and her support will say oh she won and uh and trump is terrible so i don't... think anything very much will change as a result of this debate. okay, so uh, our guest from dallas here, uh, please, if you could please tell us what you think about some key issues that were raised. we did even see camala harris forself mentioning that, two very

different viewpoints, so we're uh presented to the people watching the debate. as far as the us economy is concerned as a key issue that uh ripple. throughout the world and the effects of us economy can be seen almost everywhere in the world uh, how do you see those two viewpoints differ? well, i want to make two points, i'll start with the economy and then i'll start and then i'll cover uh something that uh kamela harris said and that uh donald trump uh said, now um with the economy here in the united states inflation is high, trump uh repeatedly mentioned that. that now of course the moderators, they tried to step step aside from that, but trump repeated that, so that was good of trump that he kept drilling that point home. uh, the inflation is very high in this country. trump also mentioned about uh, many of the manufacturing jobs, they're not here in the

united states, many manufac american manufacturing jobs, they're in mexico, those plants, those manufacturing plants have relocated to mexico. now trump responded that, look, i will hit them with huge tariffs, if they're going to uh produce those products in mexico and then ship them to the united states to sell them here, well it's not going to be profitable for them to do that, because i will hit them with a big tarif. now of course cumla harris, she tries to strike back against that, so uh, trump won in that instance right there, but however, "as i said, kamla harris's performance, especially when you consider the very bad performance of joe biden, harris harris's performance was pretty dark gone good. now the other point that i wanted to mention that's not about the economy was when uh uh

trump brought, well the moderators actually brought up this january situation, and then trump said, well look, nancy, the speaker of the house, democrat speaker of the house, nancy pelosi when i asked her if she needed more security on january the 6th, because there are some some people who are very, very angry who's going to be very angry in the crowd, nancy pelosi refused trump's uh offer the national guard and then she was also caught a video speaking to her daughter in the in a car that it was her fault with regards to what happened on january the 6th because she did not adhere to sound and good security for that particular day so trump. scored big on that point right there and but a lot of other areas trump did not score so

uh uh uh uh so much i mean he he did drill home about illegal immigration he drilled that home over and over and over again but that was not enough with regards to kamla harris who brought up the situation about oh well uh you're a convicted criminal you've been convicted when trump's says, well look, joe biden was uh brought up uh, was investigated for uh taking classified documents and he did, joe bidon did it for for decades and he was not president, as senator he did it, as vice president he was doing that, so he did not have any executive privilege as as a president, so uh, the justice department, they totally uh absolved joe biden of all of that. conver uh conversely to contrast that with donald

trump, they carried out a long-term investigation and tried to indict trump on classified documents and trump was president, so the supreme court eventually says, no, no, no, no, trump has uh immunity from that, he has presidential or executive immunity from that, but the point... that was trump was making was that the corrupt american justice department were carrying out investigation on the part of joe biden and uh vice president kamla harris, but then with joe biden who who had violated the classified documents far worse, they absolved him of that, so that is a situation where uh donald trump made very, very good point that the american... justice system is corrupt, the fbi is corrupt, and he mentioned with the fbi, you had a situation

where they were talking about trump mentioned how crime has risen and partly related to illegal immigration has risen in this country, and then the moderators helping kamla harris out, the moderators says, well the fbi says and comala agreed, the fbi said that that is not the case, and then trump said, well the fbi did not invest, did not. into account all of the cities, especially the cities where you have a large number of illegal immigrants, so what trump was essentially saying is that you have corruption within the american fbi, and we know that because the fbi went after donald trump when he was president, the fbi lied and carried out fiser to get fiser warrant to carry out an illegal spying operation upon a president elect and then president donald trump years. go, so um, i'll conclude with that part there, yeah, and of course all of

these uh issues are uh quite intriguing for the international community who's watching closely what's happening in the us uh and of course the us as a country advocates democracy uh so uh mr. sasmily, one of the most heated policy discussions came up when trump and harris clash over how they would handle russia's uh the russia ukraine war. and uh of course their responses revealed very huge differences. uh, what is your take on that? by the way, just my my name is samuel, just just as a by theby. um, well, i think it was very interesting um, that harris um, took a completely belligerant stance um, on the war in ukraine, um, basically just continuing with the uh the biden administration uh policy of indefinite war um

and um what should have been the proper question from any uh fair uh moderator would have been well what's the strategy here what's the end game here how do you plan to defeat russia which is nuclear superpower how can you possibly do that, are you not endangering um the uh world with um nuclear holocaus? but instead of that, the uh moderators, took entirely the stance of the bite demonstration and of course the uh the foreign policy elite that govern washington and sort of made trump the bad guy because trump had said, well i i i intend to bring peace uh really as soon as i'm elected even before uh i'm inaugurated uh as i'm going to

bring peace and uh the moderator asked what don't you want ukraine to win? "and trump reasonably said, i want this war to come to an end, which is what any civilized human being should say, and having answered that question, then the moderator asked again, even though trump had obviously answer that question, don't you want ukraine to win? i said, no, i want this war to come to an end, and that should should be instructive for the american people, and should be instructive for the world, that you have one side. that wants to just continue this war, which means continue this fighting which hundreds of thousands have already died, and therefore you continue it and then hundred thousands more will continue to die, it's it's already cost 200 billion dollars for the united states, enormous amount in europe, it's led

to economic downturn in europe, and harris. view is, well let's just continue without any idea of how you are you planning to bring this to any conclusion. i think that was very striking moment in that debate, and it should, if if trump i think had been a more effective debater, he's never been a particularly effective debate, if had been a more effective debater, then he should have just drawn a contrast, i am the candidate who intends to bring peace to ukraine, whether he does it or not, that's a different issue. but he at least he intends to bring this war to an end as opposed to the uh other side um which just simply plans to go on you know for year after year with hundreds of thousands uh getting killed and i think that that's what was an important uh contrast between the two candidates okay i can see mr west nodding uh

obviously he agrees with you so mr west despite the differing rhetoric and the strategies of the two candidates uh is there a meaningful meaningful difference on how they would conduct foreign policy if they become president or uh let's put it this way, basically do you believe does it make a difference who sits in the white house when it comes to foreign policy? well the answer is yes it does make a difference but uh think i think the question could be asked how much of a difference now um well

now donald trump to some extent, as i gave that that one example just moment ago, he is controlled also to some extent by the military industrial complex, and the way they do that, they put pressure on you as an individual, you as a president, uh, pressure such as, well, we have you under investigation for this or that, with donald trump, you saw all of that during his

presidency, you would see the same thing with kamela harris uh, if she tried to uh... move herself from the uh objectives and goals of the military industrial complex, so but in summation i would say this, with donald trump, there is more control in the presidency, less control for the likes of the military industrial complex or what some call the deep state, okay, career, career uh uh uh politicians, career, uh bureaucrats within the government, that's the deep state, there's less control with donald trump, there's far far more control if comala harris was to become president, and in fact i would say, i would... venture to say that if comela harris was to become president, she would be a president under which the deep state and the military industrial complex had the

maximum amount of control with. okay, so uh, we're running out of time, mr. zamuli, if you could please answer that quickly. was there any particular moment or issue that you feel was the most important or the defining moment the debate? moment of the debate was um on on ukraine, the fact that trump said, i intend to bring it to an end, and this elicited this response, well, don't you want ukraine to win? i think that the it will be absolutely up in the air, if trump does become president, whether he will be able to follow through on his policy, i think to end these conflicts, i think trump does believe... even has done since 2015, 2016, that these wars are weakening america, that they're debilitating america, it's it's leading to deindustrialization of america,

financialization of the economy, and he thinks that that's the way forward, which is to bring this these wars to an end, now he tried that in his first term, he made very bad appointments, mike pompeo secretary of state, john bolton, national security advisor, he twice tried to move bring american forces out of... twice he was sabotaged by uh the the the deep state um so it's it's a real question, mean we just don't know the answer whether he will be able to uh fulfill that agenda of bringing american involvement in ukraine to an end, he will encounter massive resistance um if it went down that path, including my colleague suggested that including impeachment, um we know 100% of the democrats will vote. both in in the house and in the senate to impeach trump for anything, so all all of those votes already lined up against trump, he only has to lose few republicans in in the senate to

be in danger of getting convicted and thrown out of office. thank you very much, mr. george zamuli, senior research fellow at the global policy institute of budapest, and mr. thea west, political commentator from dallas, texas. thank you very much. to both of you for sharing your thoughts and views with us on this edition of spotlight and thanks to all of you viewers for watching this edition.

what happened today? is no accident, it is the continuation of the killing of 17 of of beta's residents uh during demonstrations since uh 2021. it is intentional killing that is now receiving the light of day, enjoy receiving that receiving the light of day because she is an american citizen, it was intentional killing that cannot be justified.

isrite kills nearly 20 palestinians a school in central gaza as a genocidal war's death toll tops 41,000. hamas reiterates its support for you and back up. was sease fire plan saying it will never accept any new demands or conditions set by any party, israel forces killed at least eight palestinians and air strikes on two cities across the occupied westbank.