feel nothing small ? this is a special edition of "nightline." your voice, your vote. the presidential debate. >> tonight, historic showdown. donald trump and hillary clinton go head to head. >> i have much better judgment than she does. there's no question about this. >> we'll tell you who took the night. >> he piggy -- >> the most incendiary exchanges and costly mistakes. the public reacting. >> this special edition of "nightline," "your voice, your vote," the presidential debate,

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super fast 100 meg internet, tv and phone for just $69.99 per month online. cable can't offer internet speeds this fast at a price this good. only fios can. this is a special edition of "nightline." "your voice, your vote, the presidential debate." >> good evening. was political theater of the highest order. hillary clinton and donald trump sparring over race, jobs, terrorism, and temperament. it got fiery, it got personal, and it all happened in front of a live audience expected to reach super bowl proportions. but did it move the needle in an extremely close race? we kick off this special edition of "nightline" with abc's david wright who's at the debate site at hofstra university. >> good evening, dan. as presidential debates go, this

reality show of all-time. a battle where the stakes couldn't be higher, or the national poll numbers more evenly matched. this contest now down to these two survivors, two of the least-popular politicians to seek the presidency in modern times. in just 41 days, one of them will be voted off the island. >> typical politician. all talk, no action. >> reporter: tonight on long island, a battle royale. >> i have a fee of this evening i'm going to be blamed for everything that's ever happened. >> why not? >> why not, yeah, why not. >> reporter: donald trump at times barely concealing his contempt -- >> in all fairness to secretary clinton -- yes, is that okay? good. i want you to be very happy. >> reporter: did his best to brand hillary clinton as the champion of politics as usual. >> you've been doing this for 30 years. why are you just thinking about

it and now you're just starting to think of solutions? i will -- excuse me. i will bring back jobs, you can't bring back jobs. >> well, actually, i have thought about this quite a bit. >> for 30 years. >> i have -- well, not quite that long. >> reporter: hillary clinton did her best to keep a smile on her face. >> donald, it's good to be with you. >> reporter: as she stuck in the shiv. >> i think donald just criticized me for preparing for this debate. and yes, i did. and you know what else i prepared for? i prepared to be president. and i think that's a good thing. >> reporter: tonight's debate marked the first time these two candidates have shared the same stage in realtime. the debate, the voters' first chance to compare them side by side. the last time they were face-to-face was more than a decade ago at trump's wedding. tonight -- >> that is just not accurate. >> reporter: a lot less chummy.

enemy everything you want to do. >> no, we're not. >> no wonder you've been fighting isis your entire adult life. >> reporter: clinton goaded trump about his failure to release his tax returns. >> there's something he's hiding and we'll guess, we'll keep guessing at what it might be he's hiding. >> reporter: trump goaded her about her e-mails. >> i will release my tax returns, against my lawyers' wishes, when she releases her 33,000 e-mai deleted. >> i made a mistake using a private e-mail. >> that's this year. >> i think we saw two trumps tonight. the first part of the debate, the trump that was composed. most of the rest of the debate, the visceral trump. >> reporter: clinton questioned trump's record in business. >> donald was very fortunate in his life, and that's all to his benefit. he started his business with $14 million borrowed from his father. and he really believes that the

everything will work out from there. i don't buy that. >> my father gave me a very small loan in 1975, and i built it into a company that's worth many, many billions of dollars. >> i've met dishwashers, painters, architects, glass installers, marble installers, drapery installers, like my dad was, who you refused to pay when they finished the work that you asked them to do. >> maybe he didn't and i was unsatisfied with his work. >> do thousands -- >> which our country should do too. >> i can only say i'm certainly relieved my late father never did business with you. >> reporter: both candidates faced questions about healing the racial divide. especially after the recent spate of police shootings, including charlotte and tulsa. >> do you believe that police are implicitly biased against black people? >> lester, i think implicit bias is a problem for everyone, not just police. i think unfortunately too many

to conclusions about each other. >> first of all, secretary clinton doesn't want to use a couple of words. and that's "law" and "order." and we need law and order. >> reporter: clinton did not call trump a bigot. but she did call him a racist. >> he actually was sued twice. by the justice department. so he has a long record of engaging in racist behavior. and the birther lie was a very hurtful one. >> first of all, i got to watch in preparing for this some of your debates against barack obama. you treated him with terrible disrespect. so when you try to act holier than thou, it really doesn't work. >> reporter: trump blamed clinton for destabilizing the middle east. >> well, i hope the fact-checkers are turning up the volume and really working hard. donald supported the invasion of

>> that is absolutely proved over and over again. >> wrong. i did not support the war in iraq. that is a mainstream media nonsense put out by her. because she frankly i think the best person in her campaign is mainstream media. >> my question is -- >> would you like to hear? i was against the war -- wait a minute. i was against the war in iraq. just so you put it out. >> the record shows otherwise. >> the record does not show that. >> why did yous -- >>he right. when i did an interview with howard stern, first time anybody's asked me that, i said very lightly, i don't know, maybe, who knows. >> reporter: actually in september 2002, trump told howard stern he was for the war in iraq. >> are you for invading iraq? >> yeah, i guess so. you know, i wish it was -- i wish the first time it was done correctly. >> reporter: each accuse the other of being temperamentally unfit to serve as commander in chief. >> she spent hundreds of

advertising -- they get madison avenue into a room, they put names, temperament. i think my strongest asset, maybe by far, is my temperament. i have a winning temperament. i know how to win, she does not. >> secretary clinton? >> whoo, okay. >> reporter: clinton hit back with a line she's used before. >> so a man who can be provoked by a tweet should not have his fingers anywhere near the nuclear codes, as far as i think anyone with any sense about this should be bit old i must say. >> it's a good one, though, well describes the problem. >> reporter: tonight's debate generated plenty of heat but not much light. the subject of immigration never came up. some of the other issues barely got past the name-calling. trump accused clinton of lacking the stamina to be president. >> as soon as he travels to 112 countries and negotiates a peace deal, a cease-fire, a release of

opportunities in nations around the world, or even spends 11 hours testifying in front of a congressional committee, he can talk to me about stamina. >> i agree. she's got experience. but it's bad experience. and this country can't afford to have another four years of that kind of experience. >> reporter: clinton accused trump of misogyny. >> one of the worst things he said was about a woman in a beauty contest. he loves beaut supporting them, hanging around them. and he called this woman miss piggy. then he called her miss housekeeping, because she was latina. donald, she has a name. alicia machado. >> where did you find it -- >> she has become a u.s. citizen. >> oh, really? >> you can bet she's going to vote this november. >> i thought donald trump did well the first few rounds. in almost all the other rounds

off whenever he went -- got questioned about his personal business or personal taxes. and i thought hillary clinton came in calm, cool, collected and stayed that way. >> reporter: now the spin by both campaigns working the doors, hoping to dominate tomorrow's headlines. and something you normally don't see in the spin room, donald trump spinning himself. >> mr. trump, how do you think you did tonight? >> i thought it was great. i mean, i got everything i wanted to say, i got it out. bill. and i didn't want to do it with chelsea, who i think is a very wonderful young lady. i didn't want to say what i was going to say with chelsea in the room. so maybe they're well off to bring chelsea all the time. >> reporter: even though more people watched this debate than any other presidential debate in history. what's even more important are the reviews tomorrow. i'm david wright for "nightline" at hofstra university. >> david wright right there for history tonight.

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welcome back to our special edition of "nightline." joining me for more debate analysis, l.z. granderson and kristin sultis anderson. who came out on top, if anybody? >> i think in this debate, they are who we thought they were. if you already liked donald trump you probably liked his

performance. they both doubled down on the things their supporters already love about them. think the question is how will the undecideds break? on the one hand folks that are sort of reagan democrats. they should be in clinton's camp but they like trump's fiery rhetoric, saw plenty of that tonight. then more moderate republicans, should be in trump's camp, but are concerned about his temperament. i think he did not put those concerns to bed tonight. >> in your interview, l.z., did somebody come out on top? >> i agree 100% with depend upon your attitudes going into this. the one thing about the undecideds, if they had any questions about donald trump's temperament, i don't think he gave them any peace at the evidence the night. once she's brought up his father, he seemed to unravel a little bit. as the night went on not only was he overrunning her, he was overrunning the moderator. if you're thinking what kind of president would this be at the u.n., i think you saw that, and that may not be comforting. >> were there defining moments

>> donald trump went on the attack and said, hillary clinton has lots of experience but it's bad experience. he's trying to say, look, i may be risky, you may not love my temperament, but she's not going to bring you the change we need, she's more of the same. >> there is a moment for you that cut through? >> definitely. every single moment that was connected to race. whether it was hillary clinton and the way she prodded him or donald trump himself and the way he answered. i think as the night went on you got more and more disturbed by how he handled the issue race. it's a response for the department of justice lawsuits saying, hey, we settled, we didn't admit guilt. doesn't feel really good. stop and frisk, we know what the results were, it was not an effective policy, it's a racist policy. >> he supported stop and frisk, and when he was confronted by the moderator saying it was found to be unconstitutional, he said that's wrong. but he was wrong. >> absolutely. then of course the issue of the president and whether or not he was born in the united states.

dealing specifically with race made him look worse and worse as the night went on. >> in the brutal math of presidential politics, given that the overwhelming majority of african-americans already in hillary clinton's camp, does it really hurt donald trump if he continues to offend this cohort of the poll lation? >> absolutely, because it's about the movement in the middle as we're talking about. the mom of the middle made up of white people who want to feel as if they're not voting for someone who's xenophobic, misogynist,ra the more he looks like those things, the less comfortable they feel about voting for him. >> talk about body language. watching these candidates, so much time spent in split screen so you could see the candidate when they were not talking. anything jump out to you as unique or remarkable about the body language? >> hillary clinton was very serene. very focused on not letting donald trump rattle her. really wanted to exude a sense of somebody who could be a stable hand on the wheel. someone who's not going to get thrown by the curveballs coming her way. on the other hand, donald trump

type of strength that's been a part of his message and americana all along. again, if you like your candidate, you probably liked how they performed tonight because they doubled down on their own strengths. >> what about you on the body language? >> my body language is about choice of color. it's interesting she chose red, which is normally associated with republicans, and he wore a blue tie, normally associated with democrats. i'm not sure if they were trying to send signals or just thought they looked better in those colors. and i think a lot of people watching as well. >> do you think tonight's debate moved the needle? >> i don't think that it necessarily did. i think there are going to be some trump voters who are republicans but have been worried about whether or not he's presidential. i'm not sure he was compelling enough on the can you pass the commander in chief test tonight. so he may see some of those moderate republicans drift over to clinton. but overall, i don't think that this changes the polls very much. >> it depends on which needle.

which i don't think will move. as we start to parse that a little bit, what happens in colorado? some of the people who are supporting johnson and stein go, maybe i can deal with hillary a little bit more. i think she came across more presidential. if you're on the fence, think she turned out looking better. state by state some needles may move. >> they'll continue to grind it out, two more debates and a vice presidential debate, there's more combat to come, both on the air and on the ground. we hope to have analysis. thank you very much, really appreciate it, l.z. and kristen. a night of bold assertions and fierce rebuttals. not all of them true. so my "nightline" coanchor byron pitts and his truth squad separating faction from fiction when we come back on this special edition of "nightline." >> this special edition of "nightline" is brought to you by volkswagen. [ "on the road again," by willie nelson ] ? on the road again ?

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truth squad. >> thank you, dan. these are two candidates accused of stretching the truth in the past. tonight they went at each other hard over honesty. perhaps the most intense exchange of the evening, who started the birther campaign, the lie that lingered for years that president obama was not born in the u.s. trump says it wasn't him, he cleared it up. >> i was the one that got them to produce the bird certificate. i think i did a good job. secretary clinton alsoou it. >> our fact checkers found that statement by trump is false. the two clashed over trump's wealth. he said his father once gave him a loan for $1 million to start his business, clinton said it was $14 million. >> donald was very fortunate in his life, and that's all to his benefit. he started his business with $14 million borrowed from his father -- >> our abc news fact checkers concluded, yes ask no. in addition to the $1 million he

did take $14 million in loans from his father's companies. on the issue of nuclear weapons -- >> he has said repeatedly that he didn't care if other nations got nuclear weapons. japan, south korea, even saudi arabia. >> that fact, it's also yes and no. donald trump has taken different positions on the issue. another contentious exchange trump has made in the past about women. >> someone who has said, pregnancy is employers. >> i never said that. >> according to fact checkers that comment by trump was also false. then in the end, the only question that remains, did either candidate change the minds of any voters? we won't know that fact until november. >> our thanks to byron and our thanks to you for watching this special edition of "nightline." we'll have the latest news and analysis of the debate on "gma" first thing in the morning and online 24/7 at abcnews.com and

thanks again for watching and good night. now on "celebrity page" tv, kylie and kendall jenner sister act in hollywood. >> you're gorgeous kendall. >> calls out angelina jolie comedian kboes off the oscar winner and doesn't hold back.

spooked. pop star's young sons decide to have a little fun with famous mom. maybe more than a little. big stars, big hollywood, "celebrity page" tv starts now. welcome to "celebrity page," i'm sonia isabelle coming to you from the "celebrity page" studio, bring you all of your entertainment with the new season and new project. >> kicking it off with the hollywood wrap. >> stars celebrating the students. joel etherton attending academy awards. >> humbling to be here and hear you speak. >> on hand to honor film people of the tomorrow.