The debate between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris kept fact-checkers busy for days, as multiple bombshell claims were made on both sides of the debate stage.
Perhaps one of the biggest claims was one Trump made against Harris, in which he accused her of supporting taxpayer-funded transgender surgeries for illegal immigrants currently being held in custody.
Not surprisingly, fact-checkers jumped on the claim and were presumably ready to shoot it down.
However, according to Fox News, the New York Times was forced to admit that Trump's claim was "basically true."
Trump sent fact-checkers into a near seizure-like state after making the claim against Harris.
"Now she wants to do transgender operations on illegal aliens that are in prison," Trump said during the debate as he knocked Harris on several policy issues.
Fox News noted:
Except the context her fact-check provided just further confirmed Trump's claim. In addition to quoting the ACLU questionnaire and Harris' response, Stolberg wrote, "she said she supported using taxpayer funds to give access to gender-affirming care to transgender and nonbinary people, including those in immigration detention and prison."
Harris had originally shown her support for such procedures in her response to a 2019 ACLU questionnaire she filled out as a presidential candidate.
Not surprisingly, the Harris campaign immediately jumped into damage control mode, scrambling to distance their candidate from such a radically progressive stance on the issue.
"That questionnaire is not what she is proposing or running on," a Harris campaign spokesperson said.
NYT admits Harris supports funding migrant sex changes in fact-check ruling Trump's claim 'needs context' | Fox News
The paper acknowledged the 'wildest sounding attack line' from Tuesday's debate was 'basically true'
The New York Times admitted an explosive attack against Vice… pic.twitter.com/DfHGbJ3xDC
— Owen Gregorian (@OwenGregorian) September 14, 2024
Many pundits on both sides of the political aisle believe that neither Harris or Trump moved the needle significantly in any one direction, though most of the Democrat-friendly mainstream media announced Harris as the "winner" of the debate.
Polls after the debate showed Trump gaining ground in some battleground states, while other polls showed Harris staying even with the former president.
In the wake of their first debate, Trump and his campaign have declined to do any future debates before the election.
