PHILADELPHIA — Republicans know Donald Trump didn’t win Tuesday’s debate. And they know who to blame: the media.
“It was three to one. They continued to so-called fact-check Donald Trump. They never did that with Kamala Harris,” Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) told reporters.
“You have two moderators there who were acting as agents of the Harris campaign,” said David Bossie, a longtime Trump adviser and Republican National Committee member from Maryland.
“It was a little outrageous that they would just fact-check one candidate,” said Tim Murtaugh, communications director for Trump’s 2020 campaign.
Trump had spent weeks setting the stage, arguing that the debate would be biased against him. Shortly after the debate began, the complaints began pouring in — on social media, at watch parties across the country — as if on cue: If anyone thought Trump was having a bad debate, it was because of the media.
The stance of Trump’s supporters on Tuesday stood in contrast to the June debate against President Joe Biden on CNN, which lacked any fact checking and left Trump saying he had been treated “very fairly.”
Just 40 minutes into Tuesday’s debate, Trump himself charged that he had been treated unfairly, a charge that fits his longstanding criticism of the news media, which he claims is biased.
“I thought this was my best debate EVER, especially since it was THREE TO ONE!” the GOP presidential candidate posted on Truth Social.
Trump’s surrogates and staff in the post-debate spin room agreed with him.
During the 90-minute debate, ABC News’ David Muir and Linsey Davis repeatedly attempted to set the candidates — and the viewing public — straight about Trump’s baseless allegations. Those false claims included the viral accusation that Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio, are killing and eating pets, the accusation that Democratic states allow the killing of babies after birth, and Trump’s declaration that crime in the country is “through the roof.”
Harris’s claims were less far-fetched, and — to the chagrin of Republicans — the moderators didn’t correct her in the same way. Davis did, however, confront Harris about her spin on key issues, including fracking and buybacks for assault weapons. She also challenged her on why the Biden-Harris administration waited until six months before the election to issue executive actions at the border.
For Republicans watching, the skewed fact-checking undermined the legitimacy of the debate and reinforced the long-held belief that the mainstream media is biased against conservatives, and Trump in particular.
“They’ve made themselves the story,” Rep. Michael Waltz (R-Fla.) said on the spin room. He criticized the moderators for not fact-checking Harris’ comments about Charlottesville, which he said were taken out of context. He also said that Trump’s comments about his loss being a “bloodbath” were meant to be about energy policy, not the election.
Trump has repeatedly tried to manage expectations about the debate. As recently as last week, he insisted at a Fox News town hall that Harris would receive questions beforehand, despite no evidence to support his claim. The moderators quashed speculation early in Tuesday’s debate by saying that neither nominee had seen questions beforehand.
Some journalists who cover the news media industry praised Davis and Muir’s performance, and Republican pollster Frank Luntz, a Trump critic, posted on X to compliment the moderators for “covering a broader range of topics than most debates.”
An ABC News spokesperson declined to comment on Trump’s attacks on their credibility.
During debate nights in New York and Florida, Republicans felt the battle was unfair.
“I think she would have a home-field advantage overall,” said Gavin Wax, president of the New York Young Republican Club, which organized a watch party. “They certainly asked her a few questions about some of the policy changes over the years, but I didn’t really see any fact-checking on her, and I think that was absolutely necessary.”
At various points throughout the evening, partygoers expressed anger over the moderators’ criticism of Trump’s claims.
In Coral Gables, Fla., Katherine Amholt, a board member of the Women’s Republican Club of Miami Federated, which organized a viewing party, pointed to opportunities she saw for moderators to check Harris on his connection between Project 2025 and Trump, who did not write the plan, though many members of his former administration did. (Trump again denied any connection to the Heritage Foundation effort during the debate.)
Kevin Cooper, vice chairman of the Miami-Dade GOP, said he wished the moderators had asked Trump more about his vision for the country instead of heated topics like Jan. 6 and the criminal charges.
“It’s more about judging grievances than it is about the future of our country, and that’s really the moderator’s fault,” he said. “Very few questions started with, ‘What would you do?'”
Jessica Piper and Alex Isenstadt contributed to this report.
