What Will Donald Trump’s Debate Strategy Be?

What topics will the former President lean into, and how will he approach it?

Lauren Elizabeth
3 min readSep 8, 2024
Photo by Max Letek on Unsplash

It’s hard to believe just how quickly this election season has flown by. Everything has been passing in this sort of surreal blur as we head to one of, if not the most critical and consequential election in American history, and that feeling has multiplied tenfold since Joe Biden announced he was stepping down from his campaign and endorsing Kamala Harris. The downward trend of the Trump campaign has been clearly evident and well documented ever since, and leading up to the debate on Tuesday I can’t help wondering what sort of techniques he will use or topics he will lean into in order to shift the momentum back in his direction.

One could easily argue that ever since he emerged on the national political stage and took the escalator down to the stage at Trump Tower, Trump’s desire and ability to get his opponents flustered has been one of his best tactics that he has leaned into frequently over the years. No matter how much bluster might come from his opponents, or the finger wagging from the media, it’s never changed. I mean, how can we forget when he called Ted Cruz’s wife ugly, and Cruz was phone banking for him not long after? With that in mind, why would he ever change his approach willingly?

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Lauren Elizabeth

Lauren is a writer & leftist with analysis on topics related to politics & policy. She can be reached at LaurenMartinchek@gmail.com or Twitter @xlauren_mx