The presidential debate is long over, but one question raised during the performance remains unanswered: Do Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, eat ducks and cats?
In another strange development in this strangest political season, former President Trump made his remarks in response to claims circulating in a social media post that featured video footage of Springfield residents complaining that Haitian refugees were preying on local geese and cats.
The town's mayor, who also runs the refugee resettlement program that brought Haitians to Springfield, denies there is a problem.
Peter Schweitzer and Eric Eggers look into the Springfield issue in the latest episode. Drill Down podcast. They don't take a position on the cat-versus-goose argument, but point out that Springfield does have a real problem, and the Biden-Harris administration is partly to blame. The co-hosts point out that the Biden administration has accepted 20,000 Haitian refugees into Springfield, which had a pre-refugee population of 59,000.
The details of the cat's story remain unclear, but one thing is clear: a local 11-year-old boy was killed on a school bus by a Haitian immigrant with an unrecognized international driver's license. Collided with a bus last year.
In response to the refugee crisis, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine sent state law enforcement officers to help secure Springfield and called on the Biden administration to act. “They have to act,” DeWine said. “It's their policies that have created this surge.”
Whether the Biden administration intends to help Springfield is another matter. Officials at the Government Accountability Institute confirmed that Clark County, Ohio, where Springfield is located, was won by Trump by 23 points in the 2020 election.
Schweitzer and Eggers also noted other notable aspects of the debate, including the clear bias of ABC's moderators in favor of Harris, who were fact-checked by David Muir and Lindsey Davis at least four times but never corrected Harris' incorrect statements.
Peter Schweitzer, host of the Drill Down podcast, was himself an award-winning debater in his student days. These days, he avoids watching presidential debates because he finds them too upsetting. “I get too emotional during debates. I get upset when the candidates say stupid things. I get upset when someone lies. And I'm probably most upset with the moderator,” he says.
Critics of ABC's choice of host pointed out that Ms Davis is a member of the same sorority, Alpha Kappa Alpha, as Ms Harris at the same university, and has other conflicts of interest.
One of Kamala Harris' biggest fans and longest-standing donors has been identified as Dana Walden, a senior Disney executive who also holds the ABC News portfolio. Walden has donated to Harris' campaigns since 2003, when she ran for San Francisco district attorney, and hosted fundraisers for various Harris campaigns up until 2022, when she came under the ABC News umbrella as a senior Disney executive, according to published reports.. ABC News denies that Walden had any influence on the host selection.
“One of the things I learned from debate is that it's not about Socratic truth-seeking, it's about winning,” Schweitzer said.
For more articles by Peter Schweitzer, Drill Down Podcast.
