LARRY KUDLOW: Donald Trump had more haymakers than you think

In the presidential debate last night, Donald Trump had some very serious haymakers on policy that knocked Kamala Harris for a loop. 

Now, right at the top, Mr. Trump got his tax cut and economic growth message out.

FORMER PRESIDENT TRUMP: Everybody knows I’m an open book. Everybody knows what I’m going to do: cut taxes very substantially and create a great economy like I did before. We had the greatest economy. We handed them over a country where the economy and where the stock market was higher than it was before the pandemic came in. Nobody’s ever seen anything like it. 

Then he followed up right away with his attack on inflation. Roll the tape.  

HOW DO CONSUMER PRICES COMPARE IN THE BIDEN ERA WITH THE TRUMP ERA 4 YEARS AGO? 

TRUMP: I had no inflation, virtually no inflation. They had the highest inflation perhaps in the history of our country because I’ve never seen a worse period of time. People can’t go out and buy cereal or bacon or eggs or anything else. The people of our country are absolutely dying with what they’ve done. They’ve destroyed the economy. 

Trouble is, the ultra-biased ABC moderators only had one question on the economy, which is the number one issue for this election. 

That was clearly to Mr. Trump’s disadvantage, and it helped Kamala, who really has no defense for the failure of “Bidenomics,” and I acknowledge she succeeded in distracting Mr. Trump on some things like J6 or the size of his rallies or the 2020 election outcome, but Mr. Trump kind of pounded her constantly on the open border illegal immigration catastrophe.  

He also hit her hard on foreign policy, especially their failure on Afghanistan, which then led to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Harris had her usual non-support for Israel in the Iran-Hamas wars. Meanwhile, Trump won big on all those points. 

He also won big on the crime issue and on the unpopular EV Green New Deal climate change misnamed Inflation Reduction Act issue. He hit her on all that, and frankly, she didn’t have any comeback.  

Then, Mr. Trump knocked her back on Biden-Harris judicial lawfare and weaponization when she tried to just call him a “felon.” Then, Mr. Trump whacked her on some more on her untruths regarding things like Project 2025 and in vitro fertilization, which he favors. Then, she accused him of signing a national abortion ban, which he has denied many, many times and denied it again last night.  

Meanwhile, Mr. Trump asked her bluntly whether she favored abortions in the seventh, eighth or ninth months or even partial birth, and she would not answer. So, I think those are all losers for her, every one of them. 

Now, it’s too bad the former president didn’t detail his pro-growth policies to cut taxes and cut regulations and cut energy costs. He could have said a lot more on that and a couple of numbers would have gone a long way.

For example, there’s brand new Census Bureau data out that shows real median household income. The typical families under Biden-Harris have still not even reached Donald Trump’s 2019 level. 

Actually, real income growth for working folks under Trump was almost five times greater than under Biden-Harris or even pre-pandemic federal spending, which as a share of GDP, averaged 20.5% under Trump, compared to nearly 26% under Biden.  

That’s an inflation problem. So, that stuff would have gone a long way. In general, I thought Mr. Trump could have emphasized the word “growth” and his growth vision, mainly because Democrats like Kamala don’t have “growth” in their vocabulary. 

Now, Mr. Trump did a good job in attacking unfair trading practices and why his tariffs were never inflationary, and indeed, Biden-Harris actually kept most of his tariffs in place, but then I wish he had mentioned Elon Musk and the Efficiency Commission to root out wasteful, inefficient and corrupt spending, maybe even rip it into the whole D.C. swamp.  

I think Elon Musk would have gone a long way in that debate. I also think he should have mentioned the support of Democrats like RFK, Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard. That would have resonated well.  

For sure, Ms. Harris was prepared and undoubtedly outperformed the very low performance bar set for her, and as I’ve said before, many times, many times, she is not stupid. She is not a moron or any of that. However, her smug facial expressions and the frequent rolling of her eyeballs — that didn’t do her any good. 

Ms. Harris’ concluding statement was really close to being a word salad, but Mr. Trump had the last word, and I thought he delivered a crunching uppercut with this. 

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TRUMP: She’s been there for three-and-a-half years. They’ve had three-and-a-half years to fix the border. They’ve had three-and-a-half years to create jobs and all the things we talked about. Why hasn’t she done it? 

Alright. Kamala Harris is Joe Biden’s copilot, and over three-and-a-half years on issue after issue — the economy, border, crime, inflation and foreign policy — she could not get the job done. I think that’s why it’s time for a change, period. Full stop.  

This article is adapted from Larry Kudlow’s opening commentary on the Sept. 11, 2024, edition of “Kudlow.”