Even if you didn’t watch the ABC presidential debate last night, you could have known Kamala Harris won just by watching the Fox News whining that immediately followed.

The fact that the Fox “journalists” immediately began attacking Harris and the debate was a sure indication that they couldn’t find anything to crow about in Trump’s performance. Otherwise, you know they would have focused like MAGA laser beams on that.

First up, anchor Bret Baier, one of Fox’s “ultimate journalists.”  He immediately complained, “It took about 40 minutes to get to a question pressing Vice President Harris on the list of changing policies from when she ran for president in 2019, about an hour before foreign policy came up. The first question of the debate, are you better off than you were four years ago? Never fully received an answer there.”

I actually agree with Baier that Harris did not properly answer that question and I think she should have. But there were many questions Trump did not answer that the moderators let go, too. More importantly, Trump had lots of time and opportunity to press Harris on the matter and didn’t.

Funny how Baier never mentioned how Trump skated on questions or his failure to press Harris on the “better off” question. Instead, Baier moved on to his brief sort-of-acknowledgment that Harris won: “Vice President Harris was clearly well prepared, practiced, on the offense much of the night. Former President Trump did take a lot of the bait that she threw out in some of those answers.” Even there, Baier tempered the praise by suggesting that Trump had adequately countered Harris: “[Trump] pointed time and again, as he did there at the end, about what she has or has not done as vice president. The question now is, how much does this move the needle?”

“Ultimate journalist” and co-anchor Martha MacCallum more explicitly put forth the “rigged debate” conspiracy theory. While she was at it, MacCallum made sure to highlight what she called Trump’s “strongest moments.”

MACCALLUM: It has to be said that [Harris] was really never held to the fire. She was not pressed by the moderators on her past positions and how she got from a very progressive, most progressive senator to where she is now. And that falls on ABC. And I think there were moments when it felt like they were helping her out and they were not helping him out. There were times when he didn't pivot as well as he should have, to move on to some of the points that he, no doubt, wanted to make. He went down a few cat and dog holes rather than rabbit holes tonight, which will be discussed, no doubt, I thought the strongest moments were foreign policy, Iran, when he talked about Ukraine, Afghanistan, and that close, "Why haven't you done it?"

Next up, chief political analyst Brit Hume. He, too, immediately launched an attack on Harris:

HUME: I thought the single question that needed to be answered tonight was, Madam Vice President, why have you changed your position? Give us your thoughts on why you changed positions, not just on the handful, the small handful of issues that were raised by the moderators, but on a range of other issues. There were like two questions on the whole thing all evening, she never had to account for her changes. Never.

Again, no criticism of Trump for not speaking up about that. CNN did the math and reported that Trump spoke for 42 minutes, 52 seconds during the debate. Harris spoke for 37 minutes, 36 seconds. Yet none of these three mentioned how Trump got extra time and failed to use it effectively against Harris.

However, Hume did admit the truth at last:

HUME: Now look, make no mistake about it, Trump had a bad night. He rose to the bait repeatedly when she baited him, something I'm sure his advisers had begged him not to do.

You know, in the first debate, when Biden attacked him, he just kept his cool and kept going. And this, in this debate, he rose to the baiting, and we heard so many of the old grievances that we'd long thought that Trump had learned were not winners politically, and there they all were - you know, talking about how he didn't lose the election and all that, I mean. So, my sense is that she came out of this in pretty good shape. How long this will last and is anybody's guess, but for tonight, at least this was pretty much her night.

BAIER: You're saying she had a good night.

HUME: I'm saying she certainly did.

I would have preferred the moderators had pressed both candidates for answer to questions. I also thought Trump got too much time to ramble in his “responses.” It was a courtesy not extended to Harris. But overall, I thought they did a good job with a tough assignment.

ABC News has posted video of the full debate and published what it calls “a partial transcript of the exchange between Trump and Harris while the debate was ongoing," though from a quick glance, it looks like a complete transcript to me. Both are here.

You can watch the Fox News sore losers below, from the network’s post-debate commentary on September 10, 2024.