Good evening from the health education campus of Case Western Reserve University and the Cleveland Clinic, I'm Chris Wallace of FOX News. And I welcome you to the first of the 20 20 presidential debates between President Donald J. Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden. This debate is sponsored by the Commission on Presidential Debates. The commission has designed the format six roughly 15 minute segments with two minute answers from each candidate to the first question, then open discussion for the rest of each segment.

Both campaigns have agreed to these rules. For the record, I decided the topics and the questions in each topic. I can assure you none of the questions has been shared with the commission or the two candidates.

This debate is being conducted under health and safety protocols designed by the Cleveland Clinic, which is serving as the health security adviser to the commission for all four debates as a precaution. Both campaigns have agreed the candidates will not shake hands at the beginning of tonight's debate. The audience here in the hall has promised to remain silent, no cheers, no boos or other interruptions. So we and more importantly, you can focus on what the candidates have to say. No noise, except right now as we welcome the Republican nominee, President Trump, and the Democratic nominee, Vice President Biden.

Gentlemen, a lot of people have been waiting for this night, so let's get going. Our first subject is the Supreme Court.

President Trump, you nominated Amy Barrett over the weekend to succeed the light. Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the court. You say the Constitution is clear about your obligation and the Senate's to consider a nominee to the court. Vice President Biden, you say that this is an effort by the president and Republicans to jam through on an appointment and what you call an abuse of power. My first question to both of you tonight, why are you right and the argument you make and your opponent wrong?

And where do you think a Justice Barrett would take the court? President Trump, in that first segment? You go first two minutes.

Thank you very much, Chris. I will tell you very simply, we won the election. Elections have consequences. We have the Senate, we have the White House, and we have a phenomenal nominee respected by all top top academic good in every way, good in every way. In fact, some of her biggest endorsers are very liberal people from Notre Dame and other places. So I think she's going to be fantastic. We have plenty of time, even if we did it after the election itself.

I have a lot of time after the election, as you know. So I think that she will be outstanding. She's going to be as good as anybody that has served on that court. We really feel that we have a professor at Notre Dame, highly respected by all said she's the single greatest student he's ever had. He's been a professor for a long time and a great school. And we just we won the election and therefore we have the right to choose her.

And very few people knowingly would say otherwise. And by the way, the Democrats, they wouldn't even think about not doing it if they had. The only difference is to try and do it faster. There's no way they would give it up. They had Merrick Garland. But the problem is they didn't have the election, so they were stopped. And probably that would happen in reverse also. Definitely would happen reverse. So we won the election and we have the right to do it, Chris.

President Trump, thank you. Same question to you. Vice President Biden, you have two minutes.

Well, first of all, thank you for doing this and looking forward to this, Mr. President. I the American people have a right to have a say in who the Supreme Court nominee is. And that say occurs when they vote for a United States senators and when they vote for the president, United States. They're not going to get that chance now because we're in the middle of an election already, election has already started. Tens of thousands of people have already voted.

And so the thing that should happen is we should wait. We should wait and see what the outcome of this election is, because that's the only way the American people get to express their view is by who they elect as president and who they elect as vice president. Now, what's at stake here is the president has made it clear he wants to get rid of the Affordable Care Act.

He's been running on that. He ran on that and he's been governing on that is in the Supreme Court right now trying to get rid of the Affordable Care Act, which will strip 20 million people from having insurance, health insurance. Now, if if they if it goes into court and and the justice and I have nothing, I'm not opposed to the justices, but she seems like a very fine person. But she's written before she went in the bench, which is her right.

That she thinks that the Affordable Care Act is not constitutional. The other thing is on the court and it was struck down. What happens? Women's rights are fundamentally changed. Once again, a woman could be held for more money because she has a preexisting condition of pregnancy. We're able to they're able to charge women more for the same exact procedure. And it gets and that ended when we, in fact, passed the Affordable Care Act. And there's 100 million people who have pre-existing conditions and they'll be taken away as well.

Those pre-existing conditions that insurance companies are going to love this. And so it's just not appropriate to do this before this election. If he wins the election and the Senate is Democrat, a Republican, then if he goes forward, if not, we should wait until February. There aren't 100 million people with pre-existing conditions, as far as I say is concerned. The people already had their say. They. OK, Justice Ginsburg said very powerfully, very strongly at some point 10 years ago or so, she said a president and the Senate is elected for a period of time, but a president is elected for four years.

We're not elected for three years. I'm not elected for three years. So we have the Senate. We have a president elected to the next during that period of time. During that period of time, we have an opening. I'm not elected for three years. I'm elected for four years. And people, Joe, the one hundred million people is totally wrong. I don't know where you got that number. The bigger problem that you have is that you're going to extinguish one hundred and eighty million people with their private health care, that they're very simply not true.

Well, you're certainly going to socialist. No. So we're not going to. Gentlemen, we're now into open discussion. Open discussion. Discussion. Yes, I agree. Go ahead.

Number one, he knows that what I proposed, what I proposed is that we expand Obamacare and we increase it. We do not wipe any. And one of the big debates we had with 23 of my colleagues trying to win the nomination that I won, we're saying that Biden wanted to allow people to have private insurance until they can.

They do they will under my proposal. Not what you said. And it's not what party has said is simply party doesn't say said your party wants to go. Socialist Party is socialist right now.

I am. And they're going to dominate you, Joe. You know that I am the Democratic Party right now. The platform of the Democratic Party is what I in fact approved of, what I approved of. Now, here's the deal. The deal is that it's going to wipe out preexisting conditions.

By the way, the twenty two hundred million the two hundred thousand people that have died on his watch. How many of those have survived or are seven million people that contracted covid? What does it mean for them going forward if you strike down the Affordable Care Act?

Joe, you've had three hundred and eight thousand military people dying because you couldn't provide them proper health care in the military. So, no, tell me. Happy to talk about. And if you were here, you wouldn't be here. It would be two million people because you were very late on the draw. You did Japan, China, which was heavily infected. You didn't want me to ban. All right, gentlemen, we just have a president who would have been much later, just a Mr.

Minister talking about two million people. You're not as a moderator. We are going to talk about covid in the next segment. But go ahead.

Let me finish. The point is that the president also is opposed to Roe v. Wade that's on the ballot as well, and the court in the court. And so that's also at stake right now. And so the election is all, you know, I know it's on the ballot. Why is it on the ballot? Because because the person on the ballot is on the ballot in the course of the court. Well, there's nothing happening there. You just don't know her view on Roe v.

Wade.

I don't know you.

All right. Let's. All right. Let's talk about we've got a lot to unpack here, gentlemen. We got a lot of time. So on health care and then we'll come back to Roe v. Wade.

All right, Mr. President, the Supreme Court will hear a case a week after the election in which the Trump administration, along with 18 state attorneys general, are seeking to overturn. That's right. Obamacare to end Obamacare. You have spent the last because they want to give. I would care if I may ask that question, sir.

Good health care.

Over the last four years, you have promised to repeal and replace Obamacare, but you have never in these four years come up with a plan, a comprehensive plan.

Obamacare first I have well, I got the individual mandate I'm going to give you I got rid of the individual mandate, which was a concept that is absolutely a big thing. That was the worst part about Obamacare.

But I may ask, like. Well, I'll ask Joe. Individual mandate was the most unpopular aspect of Obamacare. I got rid of I like you. We will press on the moderator of this debate.

And I would like you to let me ask my question and then you can answer I heard from you in the course of these four years have never come up with a comprehensive plan to replace Obamacare.

And just this last Thursday, you signed a largely symbolic executive order to protect people with preexisting conditions five days before this debate. So my question, sir, is what is the Trump health care plan?

Well, first of all, I guess I'm debating you, not him. But that's OK. I'm not surprised. Let me just tell you something like that. There's nothing symbolic. I'm cutting drug prices. I'm going with favored nations, which no president has the courage to do because you're going against big pharma. Drug prices will be coming down 80 or 90 percent. You could have done it during your 47 year period in government, but you didn't do it.

Nobody's done it. So we're cutting health care. What about all of the things that we've done? So I'll give you an example, insulin, it's going to it was destroying families, destroying people, the cause I'm getting it for so cheap, it's like water. You want to know the truth so cheap. Take a look at all of the drugs that what we're doing, prescription drug prices. We're going to allow our governors now to go to other countries to buy drugs because when they pay just a tiny fraction, this is open discussion of this stuff there.

You'll be happy. I'm about to pick up on one of your points to ask the vice president, which, as he points out, that you would like to add a public option to Obamacare. The argument that he makes and other Republicans make is that that is going to end private insurance.

It is. Well, if I thought asking the question at will, your party says, by the way, it will end private insurance and create a government takeover of health. It does not. It's only for those people who are so poor they qualify for Medicaid. They can get that free in most states except governors who want to deny people are poor Medicaid. Anyone who qualifies for Medicare excuse me, Medicaid would automatically be enrolled in the public option. The vast majority of the American people would still not be in that option.

No. So you agree with Bernie Sanders? I left on the manifesto manifesto. You socialized medicine. Look.

Hey, are you saying the fact of the matter is I beat Bernie Sanders? Not by much. I beat him a whole heck of a lot. I'm not I'm here standing facing what is would have left two days earlier.

You would have lost every Prialt. He knows how to do that. You got look very large a deal. I got very lucky.

I get very lucky tonight as well. And tonight I'm going to make sure because here's a deal.

Here's the deal. The fact is that everything he's saying so far is simply a lie. I'm not here to call out his lies. Everybody knows he's a liar.

But you I just want to I want to make sure you were dead last in your class.

First, I want to make sure. President, can you let him finish, sir? He doesn't know how to do that. He has you know, you picked the wrong guy the wrong night at the wrong time and you agreed with him. Sanders said that himself. There is no manifesto. No. Let him speak Mr. No to just lost the left. No to either. You just lost the left.

You agreed with Bernie Sanders on a plan vote resolutely. Do you have any idea what you have to do? Socialized medicine, Mr President.

I tell you what, he is not for any help for people needing health care because his because he in fact already has cost ten million people their health care that they had from their employers because of his recession, number one. Number two, there are twenty million people getting health care through Obamacare. Now that he wants to take it away, he won't look you in the eye and say that's what he wants to do, take it away. I want to give no health care at a much lower price because I know he doesn't know how.

He doesn't know how to fix it. He is never afraid of flying to an extent. He has never a single, you know, but probably doesn't realize if you're both speaking at the same time. And it's to let the president go ahead. Sir, Obamacare is no good.

We made it better and I had a choice to make very early on. We took away the individual mandate. We guarantee pre-existing conditions, but took away the individual mandate. Listen, this is the way it is, and that destroyed that they shouldn't even call it Obamacare, then I had a choice to make. Do I let my people run it really well? Or badly, if I run it badly, they'll probably blame him, but they'll blame me, but more importantly, I want to help people.

OK, I said you've got to run it so well. That's when I just had a meeting with them. They said the problem is, no matter how well you run Obamacare, it's a disaster. It's too expensive. Premiums are too high, that it doesn't work. I said we do want to get rid of it. I want to get rid of it. I understand that. But I have to have to give you roughly equal time. Please let the vice president talk.

But he has no plan for health care. We just place a sends out wishful thinking. He has executive orders, have no power. He hasn't lowered drug costs for anybody. He's been promising a health care plan since he got elected. He has none. Like almost everything else he talks about. He does not have a plan. He doesn't have a plan. And the fact is, this man doesn't know what he's talking about. All right.

I have one final question for you. Sure, Mr. Vice President. If Senate Republicans we weren't talking about the Supreme Court here, if Senate Republicans go ahead and confirm Justice Barrett, there has been talk about ending the filibuster or even packing the court, adding to the nine justices there. You call this a distraction by the president, but in fact, it wasn't brought up by the president. It was brought up by some of your Democratic colleagues in saying the Congress.

So my question to you, as you have refused in the past to talk about it, are you willing to tell the American people tonight whether or not you will support either ending the filibuster or packing the position I take and that that will become the issue?

The issue is the American people should speak. You should go out and vote. You're in voting now.

Vote and let your senators know how you on how you feeling that vote now, in effect, to make sure you, in fact, let people know he doesn't want a senator. I'm not going to answer the question because he said that because the question is the question is yes. Is the question left? Would you and who is on your list, Joe? All right, gentlemen, I think this is a court we are going to give. We have ended the segment.

We're going to move on to the second segment.

It was really a productive segment, wasn't it?

Keep yapping, the people understand you. Forty seven years you've done nothing, they understand. All right. The second subject is covid-19, which is an awfully serious subject, so. Let's try to be serious about it.

We have had more than seven million cases of coronavirus in the United States and more than two hundred thousand people have died even after we produce a vaccine.

Experts say that it could be months or even years before we come back to anything approaching normal.

My question for both of you is, based on what you have said and done so far and what you have said you would do starting in twenty, twenty one, why should the American people trust you more than your opponent to deal with this public health crisis going forward in this case? The question goes to you first, sir. Two minutes uninterrupted. Good luck. Two hundred thousand dead, as you said, over seven million infected in the United States.

We, in fact, have five percent or four percent of the world's population, 20 percent of the deaths, 40000 people a day are contracting covered. In addition to that, about between 750 and a thousand people there died when he was presented with that number. He said it is what it is, what it is, what it is, because you are who you are.

That's why it is. The president has no plan. He hasn't laid out anything. He knew all the way back in February how serious this crisis was. He knew it was a deadly disease. What did he do? He's on tape, is acknowledging he knew it. He said he didn't tell us or give people a warning of it because he didn't want to panic the American people. You don't panic. He panicked. In addition to that, what did he do?

He went in and he we were insisting that the Chinese, the people we had on the ground in China should be able to go to Wuhan and determine for themselves how dangerous this was. He did not even ask she to do that. He told us what a great job she was doing. He said we owe him a debt of gratitude for being so transparent with us. And what did he do then? He then did nothing. He waited and waited and waited.

He still doesn't have a plan. I laid out in March exactly what we should be doing. And I laid out again in July what we should be doing. We should be providing all the protective gear. We should be providing the money the House has passed in order to be able to go out and get people the help they need to keep their businesses open, open schools that cost a lot of money. You should get out of your bunker and get out of the sand trap and get in your golf course and go in the Oval Office and bring together the Democrats, Republicans and fund what needs to be done now to save lives.

So we would have listened to a minute, sir, if we would have listened to you, the country would have been left wide open. Millions of people would have died, not two hundred thousand. And one person is too much. It's China's fault. It should have never happened. They stopped it from going in, but it was China's fault. And by the way, when you talk about numbers, you don't know how many people died in China.

You don't know how many people died in Russia. You don't know how many people died in India. They don't exactly give you a straight count, just so you understand. But if you look at what we've done, I closed it and you said he's xenophobic, he's a racist and he's xenophobic because you don't think they closed our country. Now, just wait a minute to minute. You didn't think we should have closed our country because you thought it was too.

It was terrible. You wouldn't have closed it for another two months by my doing it early. In fact, Dr. Fauci said President Trump saved thousands of lives. Many of you, a Democrat governor, said President Trump did a phenomenal job. We worked with the governor. Oh, really? Go take a look. The governor said I did a phenomenal job. Most of them said that, in fact, people that would not be necessarily on my side said that President Trump did a phenomenal job.

We did. We got the gowns. We got the masks. We made the ventilators. You wouldn't have made ventilators. And now we're weeks away from a vaccine. We're doing therapeutics already. Fewer people are dying when they get sick. Far fewer people are dying. We've done a great job. The only thing I haven't done a good job. And that's because of the fake news. No matter what you say to him, they give you a bad press and it's just fake news.

They give you good press. They give me bad press, because that's the way it is, unfortunately. But let me just say some. I don't care. I've gotten used to it. But I'll tell you, Joe, you could never have done the job that we did. You don't have it in your blood. You could have never done that.

Yeah, I know how to do the job. I know how to get the job.

But you didn't do very well in swine flu, H1N1. You were a disaster. Your own short term disaster.

Fourteen thousand people died, not two hundred thousand. There was no economically you made up. There was no I guess you made a point, but don't answer. And there was no one.

There's no we didn't shut down the economy. This is his economy that's been he shut down. The reason that shut down is because, look, you folks at home, how many of you get up this morning and had an empty chair at the kitchen table because someone died of covid. How many of you are in a situation where you lost your mom or dad and you couldn't even speak to them? You had a nurse holding a phone up so you can, in fact, say goodbye to lost far too many people for more people.

And you would have been, by the way, your own had his own his own CDC director says we could lose as many as another two hundred thousand people between now and the end of the year. And he held up. He said, if we just wear a mask, we can save half those numbers just just to mask. And by the way, in terms of the whole notion of a vaccine, we're for a vaccine, but I don't trust him at all.

Do you? I know you don't. But we trust as a scientist you don't trust Johnson. We, by the way.

And let me let me move on to questions about the future, because you both have touched on. One of the two of the questions I'm going to ask are focusing on the future for President Trump, you have repeatedly either contradicted or been at odds with some of your government's own top scientists.

The week before last, the head of the Centers for Disease Control, Dr. Redfield, said it would be summer before the vaccine would become generally available to the public. You said that he was confused and mistaken.

Those were your two words. What Dr. Sulloway, the head of your operation, warp speed has said exactly the same thing.

Are they both wrong? Well, I've spoken to the companies and we can have it a lot sooner. It's a very political thing because people like this would rather make it political than save lives. It is a very political thing. I've spoken to Pfizer. I've spoken to all of the people that you have to speak to. We have great Moderna, Johnson and Johnson and others. They can go faster than that by a lot, become very political because the left or I don't know if I don't know what ahead of your operation works with doctors.

I disagree with him.

No, I disagree with him. And he didn't say that. He said it could be there, but it could also be much. And I had him in my office today.

He talked about the summer before it's generally available.

He said it's a possibility that we'll have the answer before November 1st.

It could also be what is generally available. Well, we're going to deliver it right away. We have the military all set up logistically. They're all set up. We have our military that delivers soldiers and they can do two hundred thousand a day. They're going to be this same man. It's all set up by Easter. This would be gone away by the warm weather. It'd be gone miraculous like a miracle. And by the way, maybe you could inject some bleach in your arm and that would take care of it.

This is a we said sarcastic. That was, you know, that I would have said, sir, I can't. So here's the deal. This man is talking about a vaccine. Every serious, every serious company is talking about maybe having a vaccine done by the end of the year, but the distribution of that vaccine will not occur until sometime beginning or the middle of next year to get it out. If we get the vaccine and pray God, we will make God.

We, Mr. Vice President, want to pick up that vaccine. To pick up on this question, though, you say the public can trust the scientists, but they can't trust President Trump. In fact, you said that again tonight. Your running mate, Senator Harris, goes further, saying the public health experts, quote, will be muzzled, will be suppressed, given the fact that polls already show that people are concerned about the vaccine and are reluctant to take it.

Are you and your running mate, Senator Harris, contributing to that fear?

No more than the question you just asked. And you pointed out he puts pressure and disagrees with his own scientists.

But you're saying everybody in our society can't trust the science? Well, no. No, you can't trust the scientists. She didn't say that. You can't.

She said the public health experts, quote, will be muzzled. We'll be surprised.

Well, that's what he's going to try to do. But there's millions of science and there's thousands of scientists out there like here at this great hospital that don't work for him. Their job doesn't depend on him. That's not there. The people there.

And by the way, to the scientists that are in charge, the way they will have the vaccine, very let you believe for a moment what he's telling you in light of all the lies he's told you about, the whole issue relating to covid, he still hasn't even acknowledged that he knew this was happening, knew how dangerous is going to be back in February.

And he didn't even tell you he's on record as saying it. He panicked or he just looked at the stock market, one of the two, because guess what? A lot of people died and a lot more are going to die unless he gets a lot smarter, a lot quicker.

Mr. President, did you use the word smart? So you said you went to Delaware State, but you forgot the name of your college, you didn't go to Delaware State, you graduated either the lowest or almost the lowest in your class. Don't ever use the word smart with me. Don't ever use that word. Oh, give me. Because you know what? There's nothing smart about you, Joe. 47 years. You've done nothing. I just believe you would have had.

Let me just tell you something, Joe, if you would have had the charge of what I was put through. I had to close the greatest economy in the history of our country. And by the way, now it's being built again and it's going out to the economy in the next segment, sir. OK, it's going up fast, OK?

When it comes to how the virus has been handled so far, the two of you have taken very different approaches. And this is going to affect how the virus is handled going forward by whichever of us ends up becoming the next president. I want to quickly go through several of those reopenings. Vice President Biden, you have been much more reluctant than President Trump about reopening the economy and schools, sir, because he doesn't have a plan.

If I were running, I know what the plan is. You've got to provide these businesses the ability to have the money to be able to reopen with the PPE as well as with the sanitation they need. You have to provide them. Nancy Pelosi. Well, he's just just for a minute, tell it, as you know and way, Nancy Pelosi and Schumer, they have a plan. He won't even meet with them. The Republicans won't meet with the Senate.

And he sits he sits on his golf course. And I mean, literally think about it. You probably think of. I do, Joe.

What about this question of reopenings and the fact he wants to shut down this country and I want to keep it open and we did get shot at. Wait a minute, Jack. Let me shut you down for a second. Just for one second. We want to he wants to shut down the country, we just went through it, we had to because we didn't know anything about the disease. Now we found that elderly people with heart problems and diabetes and different problems are very, very vulnerable.

We learned a lot. Young children aren't even younger. People aren't. We've learned a lot. But he wants to shut it down. More people will be hurt by continuing. If you look at Pennsylvania, if you look at certain states that have been shut down, they have Democrat governors. All one of the reasons you shut down is because they want to keep it shut down until after the election. But they want to not because I wanted to go into another state, those states that are doing well, that are shut down.

But just respond to the shutdown.

You have begun to increasingly question the effectiveness of masks as a disease preventer. And in fact, recently you have cited the issue of of waiters touching their mouths and touching plates. Are you questioning?

No, I think I understand. If you look I mean, I have a mask right here. I put a mask on it, you know, when I think I need it. Tonight, as an example, everybody's had a test and you've had social distancing and all of the things that you have to. But I wear masks when needed. When needed. I wear a mask. OK, let me ask. I don't have I don't wear masks like him.

Every time you see him, he's got a mask. He could be speaking two hundred feet away from it. He shows up with the biggest mask I've ever seen. I will say if I was Vice President Biden. Go ahead, sir.

Look, the way to open businesses is give them the wherewithal to be able to open. We provided money that I was asking you, sir, about masks.

Well, mask, mask make a big difference.

His own head of the CDC said if we just wore masks between now, if everybody wore masks in social distance between now and January, we'd probably save up to 100000 lives. It matters. And they've also said the opposite. They've also said no, no serious person said the opposite that no.

Well, about Dr. Fauci said they did want ask you. We got a minute left and those are not good. Then he changed his mind. You said I'm not okay with masks.

I want to ask you about one last subject because you're different approach has even affected the way that you have campaigned for President Trump.

You're holding large rallies with crowds packed together. Thousands of people outside. Outside. Yes, sir. A great Vice President Biden.

You are holding much smaller events, whereas nobody will show up.

People with nobody shows up to is all right.

In any case, why are you holding the big rallies? Why do not you go first, sir?

Because people want to hear what I have to say. I mean, what worried about the president and I have twenty five thirty five thousand people show up at airports. We use airports you're not worried about. We have seen people well, so far we have had no problem whatsoever. It's outside. That's a big difference, according to the experts. And we do them outside. We have tremendous crowds, as you see. I mean, every and literally in twenty four hours notice.

And Joe does the circles and has three people someplace. Oh, by the way, did you just touch one of the last four big rallies he has and a reporter came up to him to ask him a question. He said no, no, no. Stand back. Put on your mask. Put on a mask. Have you been tested? I'm way, way far away from those other people. That's what he said. I can't I'm going to be OK.

He's now worried about you. He's not worried about the people out there breathing. We've had no negative tejal, no negative effect. We've had no negative effect. And we've had thirty five forty thousand people in one of these rallies.

Just finish up because I want to move on to our next. Yes, I would. He's been totally irresponsible, the way in which he has handled the social distancing and people wearing masks basically encouraged him not to. All right. He's a fool.

If you could get the crowds, you would have done the same thing. But you can't. Nobody can. Then can we move on to the settlement? Can we move on to the economy? Yes. The economy is, I think it's fair to say, recovering faster than expected from the shutdown.

Much in the second quarter. The unemployment rate fell to eight point four percent last month.

The Federal Reserve says the hit to growth, which is going to be there, is not going to be nearly as big as they had expected.

President Trump, you say we are in a v shaped recovery. Vice President Biden, you say it's more of a shape. What difference does that mean to the American people in terms of the economy? President Trump, in this segment, you go first.

So we've built the greatest economy in history. We close it down because of the China plague. When the plague came in, we closed it down, which was very hard psychologically to do. He didn't think we should close it down and he was wrong again. Two million people would be dead now instead of still. Two hundred and four thousand people is too much. One person is too much. Should have never happened from China. But what happened is we closed it down and now we're reopening and we're doing record business.

We had ten. Point four million people in a four month period that we've put back into the workforce. That's a record the likes of which nobody's ever seen before. And he wants to close down the he will shut it down again. He will destroy this country. You know, a lot of people between drugs and alcohol and depression, when you start shutting it down, you take a look at what's happening at some of you Democrat run states where they have these tough shutdowns.

And I'm telling you, it's because they don't want to open it. One of them came out last week. You saw that? Oh, we're going to open up in November 9th, November 9th, because it's after the election. They think they're hurting us by keeping them close. They're hurting people. People know what to do. They can social distance, they can wash their hands. They can wear masks. They can do whatever they want. But they got to open these states up.

When you look at North Carolina, when you look at these governors are under siege, Pennsylvania, Michigan and a couple of others, you get to open these states up. It's not fair. You're talking about almost it's like being in prison and you look at what's going on with divorce, look at what's going on with alcoholism and drugs. It's a very, very sad thing. And he'll close down the whole country. This guy will close down the whole country and destroy our country.

Our country is coming back incredibly well, setting records as it does it. We don't need somebody to come in and say, let's shut it down. All right. Your two minutes, sir.

We're now moved to you. As I as I said, posing the question, the president says it's a V shaped recovery. You say it's a K shaped recovery. What's the difference?

The difference is millionaires and billionaires like him in the middle of a COVA crisis have done very well. And other billionaires have made another 300 billion dollars because of his profligate tax proposal. And you only focus on the market. But you folks at home, you folks living in Scranton and Claymont and all the small towns and working class towns in America, how are you doing? This guy paid well, a total of seven hundred fifty dollars in taxes right now.

So I understand you've agreed to the two minutes, please.

I don't have it. I get my time back. The fact is that he is, in fact, worked on this in a way that he's going to be the first president United States to leave office having fewer jobs in his administration than when he became president, fewer jobs than when he became the first one in American history. Secondly, the people who have lost their jobs are those people who have been on the front lines, those people who have been saving our lives, those people who have been out there dying, people who were putting themselves in a way to make sure that we could all try to make it.

And the idea that he is insisting that we go forward and open when you have almost half the states in America with a significant increase in covid deaths and covered cases in the United States of America, and he wants to open it up more, why is he want to open it up? Why doesn't he take care of the American? You can't fix the economy until you fix the covid crisis. And he has no intention of doing anything about making it better for you all at home in terms of your health and your safety schools.

Why are schools open? Because it costs a lot of money to open safely. You know, they were going to give his administration a year to give the teachers and school students mask and then they decided, no, couldn't do that because it's not a national emergency, not a national emergency. They've done nothing to help small businesses. Nothing. They're closing. One in six is now gone. He ought to get on the job and take care of the needs of the American people so we can open safe.

Right. Your time is up, sir. We are going to get to respond to that. Well, you both had two minutes, sir. Excuse me. He made a statement that people want their schools. You know, people want their schools open. They don't want to be shut down. They don't want their state shut down. They want their restaurants. I look at New York. It's so sad what's happening in New York. It's almost like a ghost town.

And I'm not sure it can ever recover what they've done in New York. People want their places open. They want to get back to their people. They'll be safe, but they want their schools. OK, I'm the one that brought back football, by the way. I brought back Big Ten football. It was me. And I'm very happy to do it. And all right. People of Ohio are very proud of me. And you're not going to get mad when it's going to get to your economic plans going forward in a moment.

But first, Mr. President, as you well know, there's a new report that in twenty sixteen the year you were elected president and twenty seventeen, your first year as president, that you paid seven hundred fifty dollars a year in federal income tax each of those years.

I know that you pay a lot of other taxes, but I'm asking you the specific question. Is it true that you paid seven hundred and fifty dollars in federal income taxes each of those two years?

I paid millions of dollars in taxes, millions of dollars of income tax. And let me just tell you, there was a story in one of the papers that was your tax. I paid thirty eight million dollars one year. I paid twenty seven. Show us your tax returns. I went you'll see it as soon as it's finished. You'll see it. You know, if you want to do go to the board of elections, there's one hundred and eighteen page or so report that says everything I have, every bank I have.

I'm totally under leverage because the assets are extremely good and we have a very we have I believe I'm asking you a specific question, which let me tell you. I understand. I understand me know, Mr. President, that I'm asking you a question. Will you tell us how much you paid in federal income taxes in 2016 and twenty seventeen millions of dollars you paid millions of dollars of dollars, not seven dollars. And you'll get to see it and you'll get it.

But let me tell you, Chris, let me just as I think that it was the tax laws, I don't want to pay tax. Before I came here, I was a private developer. I was a private business. People like every other private person, unless they're stupid, they go through the laws and that's what it is. He passed a tax bill that gave us all these privileges for depreciation and for tax credits. We built the building and we get tax credits like the hotel on Pennsylvania Avenue.

You get a massive which, by the way, was given to me by the Obama administration, if you can believe that. Now, the men got fired right after. That happened, but Vice President Biden, you want to respond, I do want to respond. Look, the tax code that made him the put him in a position that he pays less tax and a schoolteacher makes on the money a school teacher makes is because of him. He says he's smart because he can take advantage of the tax code and he does take advantage of the tax cut.

That's why I'm going to eliminate the Trump tax cuts and we're going to eliminate those tax rates and make sure that we invest in the people who, in fact, need to help people out there need help. But why didn't he do it over the last 25 years? Because you do it all because you are president screwing things up. You are a senator and you're the worst president America has ever had.

Let me just tell you, I've done more in in forty seven months. I've done more than you've done in 47 years. Joe, we've done things that you never even thought of, including nixing the broken military that you gave me taking care of. Mr. President, we're talking about the economy.

I'd like to ask you about your plans going forward, because, Mr. Vice President, your economic plan, if you were to be elected president, focuses a lot on big government, big taxes, big spending. I want to focus first on the taxes. You proposed more than four trillion dollars over a decade and new taxes on individuals making more than four hundred thousand dollars a year and on corporations. President Trump says that that kind of an increase in taxes is going to hurt the economy as it's just coming out of a recession.

Well, just take a look at what the the analysis been done by Wall Street firms points out that my my economic plan would create seven million more jobs in his in four years, number one. And number two, it would create an additional one trillion dollars in economic growth because it would be about buying American that we have to we're going to make the federal government spend six hundred billion dollars a year on everything from ships to steel to buildings and the like.

And under my proposal, we're going to make sure that every penny of that has to be made by a company.

So I'm talking about taxes, not spending. Well, by the way, I'm going to eliminate a significant number of the tax, make the the the corporate tax 28 percent. It shouldn't be twenty one percent. You have nineteen ninety one companies federal I mean, in the Fortune 500 who don't pay a single penny in tax making billions of dollars and you do it, you were vice because Obama because you in fact passed that, that was your tax proposal.

Got it done. And you know what happened. You got it down. Economy boom. Like it's never been the economy. Let me Mr. President, let me pick up on that.

You would continue your free market approach, lower taxes, more regulation, not lower taxes.

American people. But in but in Obama's you talk about the economy booming. It turns out that in Obama's final three years as president, more jobs were created, a million and a half more jobs than in the first three years of your presidency.

They had the slowest recovery since ninety economic recovery since 1929. It was the slowest recovery. Also, they took over something that was down here. All you had to do is turn on the lights and you pick up a lot. But they had the slowest economic recovery since 1929. Let me tell you about the stock market. When the stock market goes up, that means jobs. It also means 401. KS. If you got in if you ever became president with your ideas, you want to terminate my tax, my taxes.

I'll tell you what you'll lose. Half of the companies that have poured in here will leave. And plenty of companies that are already here, they'll leave. Other places have they will leave and you will have a depression, the likes of which you've never seen.

Look, we inherited the worst recession short of a depression in American history. I was asked to bring it back. We were able to have an economic recovery that created the jobs you're talking about.

We handed him a booming economy. He blew it.

It was a LOOING. He blew it in booming. It was it was the weakest recovery. Is it is it is it fair to say he blew it when in fact, when there was record low unemployment before it?

Yeah, because what he did even before covid manufacturing went in, the whole manufacturing went not whole excuse was way over to number three. He said you would take your number two. No, Chris, Chris.

They said it would take a miracle to bring back manufacturing. I brought back 700000 jobs. They brought back nothing. They gave up on manufacturing. We are now standard fare. I'm the guy that totally gave what manufacturing we brought back.

I was asked to bring back Chrysler and General Motors brought them back right here in the state of Ohio. In Michigan. He blew it. They're gone. He blew it.

And in fact, they're going I'll had the best year it's ever had. Last year, Michigan had the best year they've ever. That is not true. Our companies come in from Germany, from Georgia and went to Michigan and went to Ohio not and they didn't come. Mr. Vice President. And so you take a look at what he's actually done. He's done very little. Trade deals are the same way. He talks about these great trade deals. You know, he talks about the art of the deal.

China has perfected the art of the steal. We have a higher deficit with China now than we did before. We have the highest trade deficit with Mexico and China ate your lunch, Joe, and no wonder your son goes in and he takes out what he takes out billions of dollars, takes out billions of dollars to manage. He makes millions of dollars. And also, while we're at it, why is it just out of curiosity, the mayor of Moscow, his wife, gave you son three and a half million dollars.

What did he do to deserve it? Did he do with Barisan deserve a one hundred eighty three thousand dollars on that answer? If not, none of that is true. Really? No. Mr. President is totally president. Please. Totally discredited. It totally discredited. And by the way.

Well, I have a million dollars. You, Mr. Vice President. That is not true. Oh, really, Mr. President, it's an open discussion. Please.

It's a fact. Well, you have raised an issue. Let the president answer this credit. It was a report one hundred and eighty three thousand a month with no experience and energy. My son did nothing wrong at first. I think he did.

Mr. President. Die, sir. He doesn't want. Let me answer because he knows I have the truth. His position has been totally, thoroughly discussed. And the media by everybody.

Well, by the media. By our allies. By the World Bank. By everyone has discredited and matter of fact, matter of fact, Mr. President, who testified under oath. So let me ask you this. No, no, go ahead, Mr.. I'm listening to you people. You get three and a half testify. HouseCalls testified under oath and his administration said, I did my job and I did it very well. I'd like to know who they are.

Well, I'll give you the list of the people I had. Sure. You've already fired most of them because they did a good job. Some people don't.

Well, here's it with you guys. Wait a minute. You get the final word.

Well, it's hard to get any word in with this clown. Excuse me. Just let me just say. No, no, no, Mr. President. That is simply why didn't he deserve three and a half million from Moscow?

Look, here's the deal. We want to talk about families and ethics. I don't want to do that. I mean, his family we could talk about all night. His families are family.

Let him family lost a fortune by coming down and helping us with governor had said that Mr. Bush, such a single one of them was this is not about my family or his family. It's about your family. Any American family, does it? That's not true. It doesn't want to talk about what you need.

You the American people. It's about you. That's what we're talking about.

All right. That's that's the end of the segment where we're moving on. It didn't take them vice president.

I know that, to be honest. It's a very try to be I don't know the answer to the question. There's no Ukraine. No, sir. With a billion dollars of you. That is, you know, when your way not true, you're doing it. You're going to have a true gentleman.

I hate to raise my voice. I'd to me, why shouldn't I be different than the two of you? So here's the data point we have.

Six segments, we have ended that segment, we're going to go to the next segment in that segment, you each are going to have two uninterrupted moments in those two interrupted minutes. Mr. President, you can say anything you want. I'm going to ask a question about race. But if you want to answer about something else, go ahead.

But I think the country would be better served if we allowed both people to speak with fewer interruptions. I'm appealing to you, sir, to do that. Well, and him too. Well, frankly, you've been doing more interrupting, but he does plenty. Well, less than less is plenty now less than you have. Let's please continue on the issue of race. Vice President Biden, you say that President Trump's response to the violence in Charlottesville three years ago when he talked about very fine people on both sides, was what directly led you?

To launch this run for president. Oh, yes. President Trump, you have often said that you believe you have done more for black Americans than any president, with the possible exception of Abraham Lincoln. My question for the two of you is, why should voters trust you rather than your opponent to deal with the race issues facing this country over the next four years? Vice President Biden, you go first. It's about equity and equality, it's about decency, it's about the Constitution, and we have never walked away from trying to court equity for everyone, equality for the whole of America.

But we've never accomplished it, but we've never walked away from it like he has done. It is true. The reason I got in the race is when those people close your eyes, remember what those people look like coming out of the fields, carrying torches, their veins, bulging beauty, just spewing anti-Semitic bile and accompanied by the Ku Klux Klan. A young woman got killed and they asked the president what he thought he said were very fine people on both sides.

No president has ever said anything like that. It is now second, sir.

Second point I'd make to you is that when Floyd was killed, when Mr. Floyd was killed, there was a peaceful protest in front of the White House. What did he do? He came out of his bunker, had the military to use tear gas so he could walk across to a church and hold up a Bible. And then what happened after that? The bishop of that very church said that it was a disgrace.

The general who was with him said he only only ever wants to do is divide people, not unite people at all. This is a president who has used everything as a dog whistle to try to generate racist hatred, racist division.

This is a man who, in fact, you talk about helping African-Americans. One in 1000 African-Americans has been killed because of the coronavirus. And if he doesn't do something quickly by the end of the year, one in five hundred will have been killed, one in five hundred African-Americans. This man this man is the is the savior of African-Americans. This man cares at all. This man has done virtually nothing. Look, the fact is that you have to look at what he talks about.

You have to look at what he did. And what he did has been disastrous for the African-American community.

So, President Trump, you have two minutes.

Why should Americans trust you over your opponent to deal with ricin, a crime bill in 1994 where you call them super predators? African-Americans are super predators and they've never forgotten. They've never forgotten. Have you ever said no, sir. It's his two minutes. So you did that and they call you super predator. And I'm letting people out of jail. Now that you have treated the African-American population community, you have treated the black community about as bad as anybody in this country you did the night.

And that's why if you look at the polls, I'm doing better than any Republican has done in a long time because they saw what you did. You call them super predators and you've called them worse than that, because you look back at your testimony over the years, you've called them a lot worse than that as far as the church is concerned. And as far as the generals are concerned, we just got the support of 200, 250 military leaders and generals, total support, law enforcement, almost every law enforcement group in the United States.

I have Florida, I have Texas, I have Ohio. I have every excuse me, Portland.

The sheriff just came out today and he said, I support President Trump. I don't think you have any law enforcement. You can't even say the word law enforcement, because if you say those words, you're going to lose all of your radical left supporters. And why aren't you saying those words? Why don't you say the words law enforcement? Because you know what? If they called us in Portland, we would put out that fire in a half an hour.

But they won't do it because they're run by radical left Democrats. If you look at Chicago, if you look at any place you want to look, Seattle, they heard we were coming in the following day and they put up their hands and we got back Seattle, Minneapolis. We got it back, Joe, because we believe in law and order. But you don't. The top ten cities and just about the top 40 cities are run by Democrats and in many cases radical left.

And they've got you wrapped around their finger, Joe, to a point where you don't want to say anything about law and order. And I'll tell you what the people of this country want and demand law and order. And you're afraid to even say it. All right.

I want to I want to return to the question of race. Vice President Biden, after the grand jury in the Brianna Taylor case decided not to charge any of the police with homicide. You said it raises the question, quote, whether justice could be equally applied in America. Do you believe that there is a separate but unequal system of justice for blacks in this country?

Yes, there is a systemic injustice in this country, in education and work and in law enforcement and the way in which is enforced. But, look, the vast majority of police officers are good, decent, honorable men and women. They risk their lives every day to take care of us. But there are some bad apples. And when they occur, when they find them, they have to be sorted out. They have to be held accountable. They have to be held accountable.

And what I'm going to do is press the United States is called a. Together, an entire group of people at the White House, well, everything from the civil rights groups to the police officers, the police chiefs, and we're going to work this out. We're going to work this out so we change the way in which we have more transparency in when these things happen. These cops aren't happy to see what happened to George Floyd. These cops aren't happy to see what happened to Brianna Taylor.

Most don't like it, but we have to have a system where people are held accountable when. And by the way, violence in response is never appropriate, never appropriate. Peaceful protest is violence is never appropriate. Right. That is peaceful protest when they run through the middle of the town and try and burn down your stores and kill people. It's not how you say it is. I'd like to continue with the issue of race. I promise we're going to get to the issue of law and order in a moment.

This month, your administration directed federal agencies to end racial sensitivity training that addresses white privilege or critical race theory. Why did you decide to do that? To end racial sensitivity training? And do you believe that there is systemic racism in this country?

Sir, I ended it because it's racist. I ended it because a lot of people were complaining that they were asked to do things that were absolutely insane, that it was a radical revolution that was taking place in our military, in our schools all over the place. And you know it. And so does everybody else. And he would know what I said about racial sensitivity training.

If you were a certain person, you had no status in life. It was sort of a reversal. And if you look at the people, we were paying people hundreds of thousands of dollars to teach very bad ideas and frankly, very sick ideas. And and really, they were teaching people to hate our country. And I'm not going to do that. I'm not going to allow that to happen. We have to go back to the core values of this country.

They were teaching people that our country is a horrible place, it's a racist place, and they were teaching people to hate our country. And I'm not going to allow that to happen. Vice President Biden, nobody is doing that.

He's just he's a racist. You just don't. Here's the deal. I know a lot more about it. Let him finish. The fact is that there is racial insensitivity, people have to be made aware of what other people feel like, what what insults them, what is demeaning to them. It's important to people know they don't want to many people don't want to hurt other people's feelings. But it's a make it makes a big difference. It makes a gigantic difference in the way a child is able to grow up and have a sense of self-esteem.

It's a little bit like how this guy and and his friends look down on so many people. They look down their nose on people like Irish Catholics like me and grew up in Scranton. They look down on people who don't have money. They look down on people who are of a different faith. They look down on people who are a different color. In fact, we're all Americans. The only way we're going to bring this country together is bring everybody together.

There's nothing we cannot do. If we do it together, we can take this on and we can defeat racism.

President, I mean, President Trump said during the Obama Biden administration, there was tremendous division. There was hatred. You look at Ferguson, you look at you go to very many places, look at Oakland, look what happened in Oakland, look what happened in Baltimore. Look what happened. Frankly, it was more violent than what I'm even seeing now. But the reason this is that the Democrats have run these cities don't want to talk like you about law and order, violent crime, haven't mentioned.

Are you in favor of law and order? I'm in favor of law.

You follow the law and order, have some. You ask for a lot of law and orders his let him law in order with justice where people get treated fairly.

And the fact of the matter is violent crime is down 17 percent, 15 percent in our administration. It's gone up on his watch, down much more.

He hurts. All right, Mr. President. Mr. President, every record and the Mr. President are going to be very happy because we're not going to talk about law and order.

We had trouble with democratic run cities. That's exactly my question.

There has been a dramatic increase in homicides in America this summer particularly, and you often blame that on Democratic mayors and Democratic governors.

But in fact, there have been equivalent spikes in Republican led cities like Tulsa and Fort Worth. So the question is, is this really a party issue?

I think it's a party issue.

You can bring in a couple of examples. But if you look at Chicago, what's going on in Chicago where 53 people were shot and eight died shot, if you look at New York, where it's going up like nobody's ever seen anything, the numbers are going up. One hundred hundred and fifty two hundred percent crime. It is crazy what's going on. And he doesn't want to say law and order because he can't because he'll lose his radical left supporters.

And once he does that, it's over with. But if he ever got to run this country and they ran it the way he would want to run it, we would have we our suburbs would be gone, by the way. Our suburbs would be gone.

And you would see problems like, you know, a suburb unless you took a wrong turn or I know somebody would not I would not go, hey, wait a minute.

I was raised in the suburbs.

This is not 1950. All these dog whistles and racism don't work anymore. Suburbs are, by and large integrated. There are as many people today driving their kids to soccer practice and or to black and white and Hispanic in the same car as there have been any time in the past. What's what really is a threat to the suburbs. And their safety is his failure to deal with covid. They're dying in the suburbs, his failure to deal with the environment.

They're being flooded. They're being burned out because his refusal to do anything, that's why the suburbs are in trouble.

I do want to talk about this issue of law and order, though. And in the joint recommendation that came from the Biden Bernie Sanders task force, you talked about, quote, reimagining policing. First of all, what is reimagining police in Maine and do you support it means let me if I might finish the question, what is reimagining policing? And do you support the Black Lives Matter? Call for for community control of policing.

Look, what I support is the police having the opportunity to deal with the problems they face, and I'm not totally opposed to defunding the police officers. It's a matter of fact, police, local police are the only one funding in his budget calls for a 400 million dollar cut in local law enforcement assistance. They need more assistance. They need when they show up for a 911 call to have someone with them as a psychologist or psychiatrist, to keep them from having to use force and be able to talk people down.

We have to have community policing like we had before where the officers get to know the people in the communities. That's when crime went down. It didn't go up. It went down.

And so we have to be talking about that. That's now with the funding that that is not true. He doesn't have any law. He has no law enforcement. That's not true, almost. But look, who do you have?

Name one group that supports you. Name one group that came out and supported you. Go ahead. I think we have time.

We don't have time to do it. All right.

Law enforcement group that came back and said, gentlemen, I think I'm going to I'm going to take back the line and I want to get to another subject, which is the issue of protests in many cities that have turned violent.

In Portland, Oregon, especially, we had more than a hundred straight days of protests, which I think you would agree. You talk about peaceful protests, many of those turned into riots.

Mr. Vice President, you say that people who commit crimes should be held accountable. The question I have, though, is as the Democratic nominee and earlier tonight, you said that you are the Democratic Party right now, have you ever called the Democratic mayor of Portland or the Democratic governor of Oregon and said, hey, you've got to stop this, bring in the National Guard, do whatever it takes, but you'd stop the days and months of violence in Portland?

I don't hold public office now. I am a former vice president. I've made it clear I've made it clear in my public statements that the violence should be prosecuted, it should be prosecuted and anyone who commits it.

But you've never called for the people. That's the leader. Excuse me, sir.

You had never called for the leaders in Portland and in Oregon to call bring in the National Guard and knock off one hundred days of riots.

They can, in fact, take care of it if you just stay out of the way. Oh. Oh, really? Oh, really.

There's no way to get the killer of a young man in the middle of the street and they shot him and three of President Francis anything. And then the U.S. Marshals on our business. Go ahead, sir.

And by the way, you know, his own former spokesperson said, you know, riots and chaos and violence help his cause.

That's what this is all about. You know who said that? I do. Who? I think Kellyanne Conway. I don't think she said she said that. And so here's. All right. Here's the point.

Point is that that's what he is keeps trying to rile everything up. He doesn't want to calm things down instead of going in and talking to people and saying, let's get everybody together, figure out how to deal with this.

What does he do? He just pours gasoline in the fire constantly and every single solitary end to end this button up this segment.

I'm going to give you a minute to answer, sir. You have repeatedly criticized the answer here.

You have stated I know you've been talking made a statement. I'm asking you. I would love to know, sir. I would love to know if you want to switch seats. We could very quickly. We can do that.

But I'm not in the National Guard. It would be over. There'd be no problem. OK, but I don't want to accept the National Guard.

You have repeatedly criticized the the vice president for not specifically calling out Antifa and other left wing extremist groups.

But are you willing tonight to condemn white supremacists and militia groups and to say that they need to stand down and not add to the violence? And a number of these cities, as we saw in Kenosha and as we've seen in Portland, are you prepared to do it?

Go ahead. Say I would say almost everything I see is from the left wing, not from the right. So what are you what are you what are you saying? I'm willing to do anything I want to see and do it, sir.

I do it. Say. You want to call them? What do you want to call them? Give me a name, give me a white and like me can process and right to my face. Stand back and stand by.

But I'll tell you what. I'll tell you what. Somebody's got to do something about Antifa and the left, because this is not a right wing problem. This is a lefty. I direct this as a left wing white supremacist and tiffy's an idea, not an organization you got. If not, that's what it is to the FBI. His FBI director said, well, you know, now that we're done, sir, you're moving on to the next administration, an idea every administration tells you.

The truth is a bad is a bad idea. And I tell you, I have no idea. Antifa is a danger.

All right, gentlemen, we're now moving on to the new records. And Phil, overthrow when a president.

I'm going to ask a question. When the president seeks a second term, it is generally a referendum on his record.

But Vice President Biden, you like to quote one of your dad's sayings, which is, don't compare me to the Almighty, compare me to the alternative. And in this case, are you are the alternative.

Looking at both of your records, I'm going to ask each of you, why should voters elect you president over your opponent in this segment?

President Trump, you'll go first two minutes, because there is never been an administration or president who has done more than I've done in a period of three and a half years. And that's despite the impeachment hopes. And you saw what happened today with Hillary Clinton, where it was a whole big con job. But despite going through all of these things, we had a fight both flanks and behind me and above. There has never been an administration that's done what I've done the greatest before covid came in the greatest economy in history, lowest unemployment numbers.

Everything was good. Everything was going. And by the way, there was unity going to happen. People were calling me for the first time in years. They were calling and they were saying, it's time, maybe. And then what happened? We got hit, but now we're building it back up again. A rebuilding of the military, including space force and all of the other things, a fixing of the the VA, which was a mess under him.

Three hundred and eight thousand people died because they didn't have proper health care. It was a mess. And we now got a ninety one percent approval rating at the VA. Our vets, we take care of our vets, but we've rebuilt our military. The job that we've done. And I'll tell you some some people say maybe the most important by the end of the first term, I'll have approximately 300 federal judges and court of appeals judges. Three hundred and hopefully three great Supreme Court judges, justices.

That is a record the likes of which very few people. And you know, one of the reasons I have so many judges, because President Obama and him left me one hundred and twenty eight. Judges to fill when you leave office, you don't leave any judges, that's like you just don't do that. They left one hundred and twenty eight openings. And if I were a member of his party, because they have a little different philosophy, I'd say if you left us a hundred and twenty eight openings, you can't be a good president.

You can't be a good vice president. But I want to thank you because it gives us almost it'll probably be above that number by the end of this term. I'm sorry. Three hundred judges. It's a record.

Looking at both your records, why should voters elect you president as opposed to President Trump?

Two minutes uninterrupted under this president, we become weaker secher. Four more divided and more violent. When I was vice president, we inherited a recession. I was asked to fix it, I did. We left him a booming economy and he caused the recession with regard to being weaker. The fact is that I've gone head to head with Putin and made it clear to him we're not going to take any of his stuff. He's Putin's puppet. He still refuses to even say anything to Putin about the bounty on the heads of American soldiers, you know, his military.

And by the way, Mr. Price.

Mr. President, your campaign agreed to both sides would get two minute answers uninterrupted. Well, your side agreed to it. And why don't you observe what your campaign agreed to as a ground rule? OK, sir, you never keeps his word.

No, I'm not. That was a rhetorical question. Can you go back 30 seconds?

Yes, you may have. All right. Go ahead.

So certainly we're poor. The billionaires have got much, much more wealthy by a tune of over four, three to four hundred billion dollars more. Just since covid you and the home, you got less.

You're in more trouble than you were before in terms of being more violent. When we were in office, there were 15 percent less violence in America than there is today. He's president of the United States. It's on his watch. And with regard to more divided the nation, it can't stay divided. We can't be this way. And speaking of my son, the way you talk about the military, the way you talk about them being losers and being and just being suckers.

My son was in Iraq.

He spent a year there. He got he got the Bronze Star. You got the conspicuous service medal.

He was not a loser. He was a patriot. And the people left behind, there were heroes. And I resent you talking. Are you talking about my son, Beau Biden you're talking about? I don't know, Beau. I know grown hunter got thrown out of the military. He was thrown out, dishonorably discharged. That's not true. It just continues. And he didn't have a job until you became vice president. What are you, not a vice president?

He made a fortune in Ukraine and China. Inmarsat is simply here is the truth. He my son watching my son and he didn't have a son. Like a lot of people, like a lot of people we know at home, had a drug problem. He's overtaking it.

He's he's he's fixed it. He's worked on it. And I'm proud of them. But why was out of my millions. But he wasn't giving up. And that is totally, totally you've already already been totally discredited with we've already been through this. I think the American people would rather hear about more substantial subjects. Well, you know, as the moderator, sir, I'm going to make a judgment call here. Three and a half million dollars. The mayor of Moscow, let's talk about that report is totally discredited.

I bet Romney on that committee said it wasn't worth Taxpayers' money. That report was written for political reasons. You know, I'd like to talk about climate change. I would. I OK. The forest fires in the West are raging now.

They have burned millions of acres. They have displaced hundreds of thousands of people. When state officials there blame the fires on climate change. Mr President, you said, I don't think the science knows over your four years you have pulled the US out of the Paris climate accord. You have rolled back a number of Obama environmental records. What do you believe about the science of climate change and what will you do in the next four years to confront it?

I want crystal clean water and air. I want beautiful clean air. We have now the lowest carbon. If you look at our numbers right now, we are doing phenomenally. But I haven't destroyed our businesses. Our businesses aren't put out of commission. If you look at the Paris accord, it was a disaster from our standpoint. And people are actually very happy about what's going on because our businesses are doing well. As far as the fires are concerned, you need forest management.

In addition to everything else, the forest floors are loaded up with trees, dead trees that are years old and they're like tinder and leaves and everything else. You drop a cigarette and the whole forest burns out. You've got to have forest.

What do you plan? What do you believe about the science of climate change?

Sir, I believe that we have to do everything we can to have immaculate air, immaculate water and do whatever else we can. That's good.

You know, we're planting a billion trees, the billion tree project, and it's very easy to believe that human pollution, gas, greenhouse gas emissions contributes to the global warming.

I think a lot of things do, but I think to an extent, yes. I think to an extent, yes. But I also think we have to do better management of our forests. Every year I get the call. California is burning. California is burning. If that was cleaned, if that were if you had forest management. Good. Forest management, you wouldn't be getting those calls, you know, in Europe, they live their forest cities, they call forest cities, they maintain their forests, they manage their fires.

I was with the head of a major country. It's a forest city. He said, sir, we have trees that are far more they ignite much easier than California. They shouldn't be that problem. I spoke with the governor about it. I'm getting along very well with the governor. But he said, you know, at some point you can't every year have hundreds of thousands of acres of land just burned to the ground. That's burning down because of a lack of manpower.

If you believe in the science of climate change, why have you rolled back the Obama Clean Power Plan, which limited carbon emissions and power plants?

Why have you relax as it was driving energy prices through the sky? Have you relaxed fuel economy standards that are going to create more pollution from cars?

Not really, because what's happening is the car is much less expensive and it's a much safer car and you're talking about a tiny difference. And then what would happen because of the cost of the car, you would have at least double and triple the number of cars purchased. We have the old slugs out there that are 10, 12 years old. If you did that, the car would be safer. It would be much cheaper by 2005. In California, they simply take a lot of cars off the market because people would be able to afford a car now.

So and by the way, we're going to see how that turns out. But a lot of people agree with me. Many people the car has gotten so expensive because they have computers all over the place for an extra little bit of gasoline. And but and I'm OK with electric cars, too. I think I'm all for electric cars. I've given big incentives for electric cars. But what they've done in California is just crazy. Vice President Biden, I'd like you to to respond to the president's climate change record, but I also want to ask you about a concern.

You proposed two trillion dollars in green jobs. You talk about no limits not abolishing, but new limits on fracking and then the use of fossil fuels to generate electricity by twenty, thirty five and zero net emission of greenhouse gases by 2050. The president says a lot of these things would tank the economy and cost millions of jobs.

He's absolutely wrong, number one. Number two, if in fact, we went out during our administration, the Recovery Act, I was able to I was in charge, able to bring down the cost of renewable energy to cheaper than are as cheap as coal and gas and oil. Nobody's going to build another coal fired plant in America. No one's going to build another oil fired plant in America. They're going to move to renewable energy. Number one. Number two, we're going to make sure that we are able to take the federal fleet and turn it into a fleet that's run on their electric vehicles, making sure that we can do that.

We're going to put 500000 charging stations and all of the highways that we're going to be building in the future. We're going to build a economy that, in fact, is going to provide for the ability to take four million buildings and make sure that they, in fact, are weatherized in a way that, in fact, they'll they'll emit significantly less gas and oil because the heat will not be going out. There's so many things that we can do now to create thousands and thousands of jobs.

We can get to net zero in terms of energy production by 2035, not only not costing people jobs, creating jobs, creating millions of good paying jobs, not 15 bucks an hour, but prevailing wage by having a new infrastructure that, in fact, is green. And the first thing I will do, I will rejoin the Paris accord. I will join the Paris Accord, because with us out of it, look what's happening.

It's all falling apart. And talk about someone who has no no relationship with foreign policy.

Brazil, the rainforest in Brazil are being torn down, are being ripped down. More more carbon is absorbed in that rainforest and every bit of carbon that's admitted in the United States. Instead of doing something about that, I would be gathering up and making sure we had the countries of the world coming up with 20 billion dollars, say here's 20 billion dollars. Stop it. Stop tearing down the forest. And if you don't, then you're going to have significant economic consequences.

What about the argument that President Trump basically says that you have to balance environmental interests and economic interests and he's drawn his line? Well, he hadn't drawn a line.

He's still, for example, make sure that he wants to make sure that methane is not a problem. We can you can now emit more methane without it being a problem. Methane. This is a guy who says that you don't have to have mileage standards for automobiles that exist now.

This is a guy who says that the fact that it's all true and here's the thing about the Green New Deal. And it's not two billion or 20 billion, as you said, it's 100 trillion dollars. I'm talking about they want to write down building and rebuild the building instead down the street. That is not where airplanes are. Adam is where two car systems are out, where they want to take out the cow is not you know, that's not true either right now.

This is a this is a 100. That's more money than our country could make it simply, if not the case. All right. Let me let me ask because I actually. Wait a minute, sir. I actually have studied your plan, and it includes upgrading four million buildings, weatherizing two million homes over four years, building one and a half million energy efficient homes. So the question becomes, the president is saying, I think some people who support the president would say that sounds like it's going to cost a lot of money and hurt the economy.

What it's going to do, it's going to create thousands and millions of jobs, good paying jobs. Let him finish, sir. He don't know how to do that day in Dallas. The fact is, it's going to create millions of good paying jobs and these tax incentives to people for people to weatherize, which he wants to get rid of, it's going to make the economy much safer. Look how much we're paying now to deal with the hurricanes, with deal with.

By the way, he has an answer for hurricanes. He said maybe we should drop a nuclear weapon on them. They make. I never said that. It's made it up. And here's the deal you make up. We we're going to be in a position where we can create hard, hard, good jobs by making sure the environment is clean and we all are in better shape. We spend billions of dollars now, billions of dollars on floods, hurricanes, rising seas.

We're in real trouble. Look what's happened just in the Midwest with these storms that come through and wipe out entire. States and counties in Iowa that didn't happen before there because of global warming, we make up 15 percent of the world's problem. We in fact, but the rest of the world, we've got to get them to come along. That's why we have to get back into back into the Paris accord.

All right, gentlemen. So why didn't he do it for 47 years? You were vice president. Why didn't you get the world? China sends up real dirt. India. Russia does. India does. They all do. We're supposed to be good. And by the way, he made a couple of statements. The Green New Deal is 100 hundred trillion dollars. That is not in my plan. That's three. Well, new one a little is my plan to do anything about it.

What if he made a statement about the military?

He said I said something about the military. He and his friends made it up and then they went with it. I never said, OK, that is is segment. He called to testify that I did best. I said, that's just stupid values. No, I would never I would not play it.

Go ahead. The vice president answered his his final question.

The final question is, I can't remember which of all his ranting about having a little trouble myself, but and about the economy and about this question of what it's going to cost the economy, the economy, the green new deal and the idea of what what your environmental changes will do.

A green new deal will pay for itself as we move forward. We're not going to build plants that, in fact are great polluting.

Plant you to build a new deal for me. You support. No, I don't support the green. No, you don't. Oh, well, that's a big statement. I accept the radical left.

I said I support the Biden plan that I put forward the Biden plan, which is different than what he calls the radical green new Deal.

All right, gentlemen, final segment, election integrity. As we meet tonight, millions of Americans are receiving mail in ballots or going to vote early.

How confident should we be that this will be a fair election? And what are you prepared to do over the next five plus weeks? Because it will not only be to Election Day, but also counting some ballots, mail in ballots after Election Day.

What are you prepared to do to reassure the American people that the next president will be the legitimate winner of this election? In this final segment, Mr. Vice President, you go first prepared to let people vote.

They should go to I will vote Dotcom, decide how they're going to vote, when they're going to vote and what means by which they're going to vote. His own homeland security director, as well as the FBI director, says there is no evidence at all that mail in ballots are a source of being manipulated and cheating. They said that the fact is that they're going to be millions of people because of covid that are going to be voting by mail in ballots like he does.

By the way, he sits behind the resolute desk and sends his ballot to Florida, number one. Number two, we're going to make sure that those people who want to vote in person are able to vote because they're not poll watchers are there to make sure they can socially distance. The polls are open on time and there are polls stay open until the votes are counted. And this is all about trying to dissuade people from voting because he's trying to to scare people into thinking that it's not going to be legitimate.

Show up and vote. You will determine the outcome of this election. Vote, vote, vote. If you're able to vote early in your state, vote early. If you're able to vote in person, vote in person, vote whatever way is the best way for you, because you will he cannot stop you from being able to determine the outcome of this election. And in terms of whether or not when the votes are counted and they're all counted, that will be accepted.

If I win, that will be accepted.

If I lose, they'll be accepted. But by the way, if in fact, he says he's not sure what he's going to accept. Well, let me tell you some. It doesn't matter, because if we get the votes, it's going to be all over. He's going to go. He can't stay in power. It won't happen. It won't happen. So vote just make sure you understand you have it in your control to determine what this country is going to look like the next four years.

Is it going to change? You get four more years of these lies. Mr. President, two minutes, so when I listen to Joe talking about a transition, there's been no transition from when I won, I won that election. And if you look at crooked Hillary Clinton, if you look at all of the different people, there was no transition because they came after me trying to do a coup. They came after me spying on my campaign. They started from the day I won.

And even before I won, from the day I came down the escalator with our first lady, they were a disaster. They were a disgrace to our country. And we've caught them. We've caught them all. We've got it all on tape. We've caught them all. And by the way, you gave the idea for the Logan Act against General Flynn. You better take a look at that, because we caught you in a sense, and President Obama was sitting in the office.

He knew about it, too. So don't tell me about a free transition. As far as the ballots are concerned, it's a disaster, a solicited ballot. OK, soliciting is OK. You're soliciting your asking. They send it back. You send it back. I did that. If you have an unsolicited they're sending millions of ballots all over the country. There's fraud. They found them in creeks. They found some with the name. Trump just happened to have the name Trump just the other day in a wastepaper basket.

They're being sent all over the place. They sent two in a Democrat area. They sent out a thousand ballots. Everybody got two ballots. This is going to be a fraud like you've never seen. The other thing, it's nice on November 3rd, you're watching and you see who won the election. And I think we're going to do well because people are really happy with the job we've done. But you know what? We won't know. We might not know for months because these ballots are going to be all over.

Take a look at what happened in Manhattan. Take a look at what happened in New Jersey. Take a look at what happened in Virginia and other places. They're not losing two percent, one percent, which, by the way, is too much. An election could be won or lost. With that, they're losing 30 and 40 percent. It's a fraud and it's a shame. And can you imagine where they say you have to have your ballot in by November 10th, November 10th?

That means that's seven days after the election in theory should have been announced. OK, we have major states with that, all run by Democrats. It's two minutes all running Democrats. And from the rig, you're going to be able to continue.

You have been charging for months that mail in balloting is going to be a disaster. You say it's rigged, that it's going to lead to fraud.

But in twenty eighteen in the last midterm election, thirty one million people voted mail in voting.

That was a quarter more than a quarter of all the voters that you're cast their ballots by mail.

Now that millions of mail in ballots have gone out, what are you going to do about it? And are you counting on the Supreme Court, including a justice parrot, to settle on a desk?

Yeah, I think I'm counting on them to look at the ballots. Definitely. I don't think well, I hope we don't need them in terms of the election itself. But for the ballots, I think so, because what's happening is incredible. I just heard I read today where at least one percent of the ballots for 2016 were invalidated. They they take them. We don't like them.

We don't like on. But there are millions of ballots going out like you do. If you go and vote, you do a solicited ballot. That's OK.

You know, are you going. I'm asking you about the fact that millions of people you go Facebook, you go and vote like this, like they used to in the millions of people either do, Chris, a solicited ballot where you're sending it in, they're sending it back and you're sending they have mailmen with lots of it. Did you see what's going on? Take a look at West Virginia mailman selling the ballots. They're being sold. They're being dumped in rivers.

This is a horrible thing for our country. Is this is not is. No, this is not going to end well. OK is nice. Vice president of five states that had mail in ballots for the last decade or more, five, including two Republican states.

And you don't have to solicit the ballot. It's sent to you. It's sent to your home. What we're saying is they're saying is that it has to be a postmark by the time, by Election Day. If it doesn't get in till the seventh, eighth, ninth, it still should be counted. He's just afraid of counting the votes here.

And I want to continue with you on the left.

Vice President Biden is so wrong when he makes his statement excuse me, Vice President Biden.

The biggest problem, in fact, over the years with mail and voting has not been fraud. Historically, it has been that sizable number. Sometimes hundreds of thousands of ballots are thrown out because they have not been properly filled out or there is some other irregularity or they missed the deadline. So the question I have is, are you concerned that the Supreme Court, with a Justice Barrett, will settle any dispute?

I'm concerned that any court would settle this, because here's the deal. When you when you file, when you get a ballot and you fill it out, you're supposed to have an affidavit. If you didn't know, you have someone say that this is me, you should be able to if it. In fact, you can verify that you went before the ballot is thrown out, that's sufficient to be able to count the ballot because someone made a mistake and not donning the correct guy who they voted for testify, say who they voted for, say it's you that is totally legitimate.

All right. Why don't you have a million ballots swamping the system?

You know, it can't be done. You know it can't. And already. All right.

So now what now says to the gentleman in the final tally in eight states, we can keep talking.

In eight states, election workers are prohibited currently by law, eight states from even beginning to process ballots, even take them out of the envelopes and flatten them until Election Day.

That means that it's likely because there's going to be a huge increase in mail, in balloting that we are not going to know on election night who the winner is, that it could be days. It could be weeks. Could be months until we find out who the the new president is.

So I first for you, sir, finally for the for the vice president.

I hope neither of you will interrupt the other. Will you urge your supporters to stay calm during this extended period not to engage in any civil unrest? And will you pledge tonight that you will not declare victory until the election has been independently certified?

President Trump, I've got my supporters to go into the polls and watch very carefully because that's what has to happen. I am urging them to do it. As you know, today, there was a big problem in Philadelphia. They went in to watch. They were called poll watchers, a very safe, very nice thing. They were thrown out. They weren't allowed to watch. You know why? Because bad things happen in Philadelphia, bad things. And I am urging I am urging my people.

I hope it's going to be a fair election if it's a fair election. And what I am a hundred percent on board. But if I see tens of thousands of ballots being manipulated, I can't go along with that. And I'll tell you that from a common sense, does that mean you ought to be able to take it means you have a fraudulent election. You send out a million ballots. Not that they're not equipped if these people aren't equipped to handle it, number one.

Number two, they cheat. They cheat. Hey, they found ballots in a wastepaper basket three days ago and they all had the military ballots. There were military. They all had the name Trump on them votes for I. That's good. Vice President Biden, final question for you.

Will you urge your supporters to stay calm while the vote is counted? And will you pledge not to declare victory until the election is independently certified?

Yes, and here's the deal. You count the ballots. As you pointed out, some of these ballots in some states can't even be opened until Election Day. And if there's thousands of ballots going to take time to do it. And by the way, our military, they've been voting by ballots for at the end of the civil war, in effect, in effect. And that's and that's what's going to happen. Why was it not why is it for them somehow not fraudulent?

It's the same process. It's honest.

No one has established at all that there is fraud related to mail in ballots, that somehow it's a fraudulent process.

It's already been established. Take a look at Carolyn Maloney. I know you had an opportunity to go ahead. They have no idea. Vice President Biden. Go ahead.

He has no idea what he's talking about. Here's the deal. The fact is I will accept it and he will, too. You know why? Because once the winner is declared, after all the all the ballots are counted, all the votes are counted, that will be the end of it. That will be the end of it. And if it's me, in fact, five, if it's not me, I'll support the outcome and I'll be a president, not just for the Democrats, I'll be a president for Democrats and Republicans.

And this guy, I want to the gentlemen, we say that's the end of this is the end of this debate, this ballot count.

We're going to leave it there to be continued as in more debates as we go on.

President Trump, Vice President Biden, it's been an interesting hour and a half. I want to thank you both for participating in the first of three debates that you have agreed to engage. And we want to thank Case Western Reserve University and the Cleveland Clinic for hosting this event. The next debate, sponsored by the Commission on Presidential Debates, will be one week from tomorrow, October 7th, at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. The two vice presidential nominees, Vice President Mike Pence and Senator Kamala Harris, will debate at 9:00 p.m. Eastern that night.

We hope you'll watch. Until then, thank you and good night.

You to.