The very first presidential debate of 2016 took place tonight and the Internet collectively lost its mind while listening to Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. A number of different issues were brought to the table including Trump’s tax returns, Clinton’s emails, the race issue in America, and how to deal with ISIS. A lot was learned after Monday night’s debate and a lot caused plenty of confusion, but here is all that was brought forth including the fact and the fiction.
As both the Democratic Party candidate and the Republican Party candidate spoke their minds, the world was determining what was real and what wasn’t.
“I hope the fact checkers are turning up the volume!” – Sick Hillary Clinton is begging the media to protect her. Weak! #DebateNight
— Mike Cernovich (@Cernovich) September 27, 2016
With the information coming forth from both Trump and Clinton, the world started to over-analyze what they were saying. The NY Times reported that Trump started things off in weak fashion, but began a “badgering onslaught” of Clinton as the night went on, and everyone saw him interrupt her time and time again.
Minimum Wage
As the evening went on, there were a number of Americans on social media who were debating whether either candidate was spewing truth. Well, a number of websites were also going through everything that Trump and Clinton said so that the world could know what was fact and what was fiction.
For instance, early on in the night, Clinton said that things needed to start with raising the national minimum wage and guarantee equal pay for woman’s work. NPR looked at her comment about the federal minimum wage and pointed out that it hasn’t been increased by Congress since 2009.
ISIS and Terrorism
Later on in the debate, the two talked about terrorist attacks and where their stance was on seeing it domestic and internationally. At one point, Trump even insinuated that the formation of ISIS was due to the actions of Clinton and President Barack Obama.
. @HillaryClinton : “Donald supported the invasion in Iraq” @realDonaldTrump : “WRONG.” #Debates #DebateNight pic.twitter.com/Tm1a3qoqVv
— Good Morning America (@GMA) September 27, 2016
This was also when Trump said that Hillary had “been fighting ISIS your entire adult life.” It may come across as nitpicking, but ISIS has only been in existence since sometime in 2013-2014. They do have roots back to the ’90s, but they did not come into true prominence until long after Clinton became an adult.
Actually, the LA Times pointed out that this was when Clinton publicly asked the fact-checkers to go to work and see that Trump was spewing a lot of fiction.
Donald Trump’s Taxes
Debate moderator Lester Holt asked Trump why his tax returns had not yet been made public, and the businessman had a detailed response. He stated he was under a “routine audit” and that once it was completed, they would be released for the voters to see. This was when Trump said he would “release my tax returns, against my lawyers’ wishes” if Clinton were to release her cache of emails.
Clinton brought up the fact that “for 40 years, everyone running for president has released their tax returns.” NPR pointed out that was indeed a fact and that in 1973, Richard Nixon released his returns after being audited by the IRS.
Personal Attacks
Numerous times throughout the evening, Trump stated that he had spent very little money on his campaign and he did it without attacking Clinton. He spoke of her campaign ads in which she constantly attacked him and must have spent a lot of money to get those out to the entire country.
This led to Clinton coming down hard on Trump for refusing to pay numerous contractors for work they had done for him. She even mentioned how in the debate crowd was an architect who had not been paid by Trump for work he had done.
Trump simply stated, “Maybe, he didn’t do a good job.”
The Environment and Energy
During the debate, Clinton accused Trump of saying that he believed climate change was a hoax which was started by the Chinese. He denied this claim and stated that he never said that, but the NY Times was able to unearth a little bit of fiction to that statement.
Apparently, back in 2012, Trump tweeted that the entire concept of global warming was indeed “created by and for the Chinese” in order to help make the manufacturing of the United States noncompetitive.
The “why not” moment — and other zingers from #debatenight #debates2016 https://t.co/HzPexGziFd pic.twitter.com/oh4qByxdOS
— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) September 27, 2016
Tonight’s presidential debate seemed to tell a lot, but at the same time, say very little. It’s going to be interesting to see who the American people think won it overall and how it affects the polls.
Monday night’s presidential debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump said a lot about the two candidates, and it could cause huge shock waves in the election. The 2016 presidential polls were extremely close going into the debate, and it’s going to be interesting to see how they are affected by what was said this evening. Some things were fact and some things were fiction, but the American people have plenty to say about it all.
[Featured Image by Drew Angerer/Getty Images]