Author’s note: This is the analysis of one round of the 2024 Presidential debate between Biden and Trump. It is linked from a more comprehensive article.
Question: With the U.S. facing trillion-dollar deficits and record debt, why should top earners and corporations pay even less in taxes than they do now?
TRUMP: Because the tax cuts spurred the greatest economy that we’ve ever seen just prior to COVID, and even after COVID. It was so strong that we were able to get through COVID much better than just about any other country. But we spurred – that tax spurred.
That last comment was mangled and dropped mid-sentence. At least he was on point, but don’t worry, he’ll pivot soon enough. And he will lose his train of thought more seriously as the debate progresses.
The claim that tax cuts spurned had the greatest economy ever is not only a gross exaggeration, it was debunked more than once. The Trump economy parallels Obama’s economy, only Obama’s economy didn’t have the Trump tax cuts.
The claim that the tax cuts got the US economy through COVID better than other countries is both misdirection and the fallacy of false cause. Yes, the US recovered more quickly than other G7 countries, but the recovery came during the Biden administration not Trump’s. I would suggest the timing of the recovery suggests Biden should get more credit than tax cuts.
Now, when we cut the taxes – as an example, the corporate tax was cut down to 21 percent from 39 percent, plus beyond that – we took in more revenue with much less tax and companies were bringing back trillions of dollars back into our country.
This is a lie. According to the Center for American Progress, “(government) spending is down, not up. But revenues are down significantly more.” This is true of both the Trump and Bush tax cuts. Furthermore, if revenues increased, why did the national debt increase by a record $8 trillion? More than twice consumer debt, and a debt that will “weigh down the economy for years.”
As for the trillions recovered, that’s a gross exaggeration. A study by the National Bureau of Economic Research, the cuts spurred investments, but reduced the rate corporations pay on income abroad (rather than recovering the money from abroad), and contributed to only 0.1 percent growth to the economy (about $750 per worker, not the thousands claimed).
The country was going like never before. And we were ready to start paying down debt. We were ready to start using the liquid gold right under our feet, the oil and gas right under our feet. We were going to have something that nobody else has had. We got hit with COVID. We did a lot to fix it. I gave him an unbelievable situation, with all of the therapeutics and all of the things that we came up with. We – we gave him something great.
Repeat Argument: I get blamed for COVID even though I fixed it. He can’t get past COVID, nor should he. It’s his albatross, and he clearly knows it.
Lying outright about the economy once again (see above) and the claim that we were ready to start paying down the debt is patently false considering the $8 trillion increase.
The sentence about liquid gold is pure nonsense. Liquid gold doesn’t occur in nature, and we weren’t getting ready to use the oil and gas under our feet. We’ve been using them for decades to the point they’re almost depleted. That would create a global energy catastrophe, which Biden’s green initiatives are trying to prevent.
That Trump’s administration came up with “therapeutics” and not private drug companies is a lie. Unless you count bleach.
Remember, more people died under his administration, even though we had largely fixed it. More people died under his administration than our administration, and we were right in the middle of it. Something which a lot of people don’t like to talk about, but he had far more people dying in his administration.
This is factually true. The conclusion Trump suggests, that Biden caused more deaths is a false cause fallacy. Many of the deaths that occurred after Biden took office can be attributed to Trump’s unwillingness to promote the vaccine he touted. In addition, the biggest wave peaked as Biden entered office. Biden inherited a trend line of 3,000 deaths a day.
He did the mandate, which is a disaster. Mandating it. The vaccine went out. He did a mandate on the vaccine, which is the thing that people most objected to about the vaccine. And he did a very poor job, just a very poor job.
Another brain fart. Basically, he says the vaccine mandate did something and it was bad. He just can’t specify what that was. That’s about as vague as you can get. It just sounds better than “we killed Medicare.”
The vaccine mandate is also irrelevant to the question of national debt.
This is also a repeat argument (Round 1). Even if it were true, it would be a gross exaggeration that his policies were a “disaster.” But SCOTUS blocked the mandate, so Trump has no business tying it to anything that happened later. So that’s an lie.
And I will tell you, not only poor there, but throughout the entire world, we’re no longer respected as a country. They don’t respect our leadership. They don’t respect the United States anymore.
This is even more irrelevant than COVID. How are the debt and national respect correlated? It’s also a lie. According to the PEW Research Center, world perception of the US slumped during the Trump presidency and rebounded after Biden took office.
Trump caused much of this loss of prestige. Polls at the time said 65 percent of world leaders had no respect for him, often ridiculing him at summits.
I could create a new logical fallacy, call it projection, or attributing your own inadequacies to others. Trump does this a lot, for instance, when he calls Biden a criminal even though he claims presidents are immune from charges of criminal conduct. In fact, I suspect that when Trump mocks anyone, he’s usually projecting his own shortcomings. But for me to use this as an argument would be an ad hominem. So I’m excluding it from the scorecard.
We’re like a Third World nation. Between weaponization of his election, trying to go after his political opponent, all of the things he’s done, we’ve become like a Third World nation. And it’s a shame the damage he’s done to our country.
We are like a third world nation is pure hyperbole. It also contradicts his claim we have the greatest nation in history. How could someone as inept as he claims Biden is reduce the greatest nation in history to third world status in three and a half years?
His claims about weaponisation and political persecution are lies. In fact, he’s shifted positions. Now Biden not only rigged the election, he weaponized it. (Not a complete reversal, just offering an even more scandalous claim.) Nowhere does he justify this claim. As to persecution, Biden has stayed out of the case, and all 88 criminal charges were brought by grand juries, launched by independent Special Counsels and states’ attorneys.
Talk about political prosecutions. Trump’s made it clear he intends to do that. Just read his Agenda 47 where he makes it clear he intends to weaponise the Justice Department.
And I’d love to ask him, and will, why he allowed millions of people to come in here from prisons, jails and mental institutions to come into our country and destroy our country.
Finally he switches to immigration, which has nothing to do with the question of national debt. Journalists have debunked the claim that millions of migrants are from prisons and mental hospitals so many times Politifact rates it a “pants on fire” lie.
Round 3a: Rebuttal
TRUMP: Well, he’s right: He did beat Medicaid (ph). He beat it to death. And he’s destroying Medicare, because all of these people are coming in, they’re putting them on Medicare, they’re putting them on Social Security. They’re going to destroy Social Security.
This man is going to single-handedly destroy Social Security. These millions and millions of people coming in, they’re trying to put them on Social Security. He will wipe out Social Security. He will wipe out Medicare. So he was right in the way he finished that sentence, and it’s a shame.
This is hyperbole and just plain bullying.
He is also creating a red herring, riffing off a mistake to rebut an issue that isn’t on the table. Biden’s argument was not about Medicare but that Trump tax cuts added to the debt and benefitted the wealthiest Americans.
lie on all three claims. He asserts “all these people coming in” are being put on Medicare, implying that immigrants are getting Medicare or Medicaid, but that is not a Federal decision. States decide who receives Medicare. Immigrants can’t even receive marketplace insurance. Most of their care comes from emergency rooms, and community and migrant clinics.
As to Social Security, immigrants must have a social security number and permission from the Department of Homeland Security. Since undocumented immigrants can’t get an SSN, and are unlikely to get permission from Homeland Security, they have no pathway to benefits.
They can’t vote either, which I point out in anticipation if claims Trump will make later.
Finally, the entire argument is a bit of a contradiction since his own party wants to cut $1.5 trillion, raise costs, and convert to a premium pay system that will price senior citizens out of the market.
What’s happened to our country in the last four years is not to be believed. Foreign countries – I’m friends with a lot of people. They cannot believe what happened to the United States of America. We’re no longer respected. They don’t like us. We give them everything they want, and they – they think we’re stupid. They think we’re very stupid people.
What we’re doing for other countries, and they do nothing for us. What this man has done is absolutely criminal.
Repeat of the prestige argument, but rephrased. Debunked. The nation’s prestige declined under Trump and restored under Biden. World leaders thought Trump was stupid.
The idea “they think we’re stupid” is
vague,
hyperbole, and
also a logical error called hasty generalization, or assuming that what is true of a few is true of all.
Who is “they” anyway? The people he talks to or the world. Doubtless, many people around the globe think we’re stupid. Just like many thought the British stupid for Brexit. Many Americans think we’re other Americans are stupid. But to imply the entire world thinks we’re stupid is unwarranted.
This notion that other countries do nothing for us, a common theme in Trump messaging, is a vague assertion, with no proof whatsoever. America’s allies contribute a great deal to our partnership: they spend billions to offset the costs of our overseas bases, take part in training our troops, they provide support for our political priorities, and helped take in refugees and contribute to world health. This is in addition to the economic benefits of trade. So not only is “nothing for us” a vague assertion, it’s a lie.
The assertion that Biden’s policies are criminal is hyperbole, and unsubstantiated. This is another logical error, to speak metaphorically, in a way some might interpret literally. I wouldn’t stress this as he not repeatedly referred to the Biden crime family and called him a criminal elsewhere.