A TV screen shows Joe Biden, right, and Donald Trump during their first debate of 2024 on CNN
US President Joe Biden, right, and Republican candidate Donald Trump participated in their first debate of the 2024 race © Mario Tama/Getty Images

The first US presidential debate of 2024 between Joe Biden and Donald Trump was bad-tempered and has already reignited concerns among Democrats about the president’s fitness for another term in office.

On Thursday night he and his Republican rival traded personal jabs. “Let’s not act like children,” said Trump. But the former president repeatedly made false claims about his record — many of which went unchallenged by the moderators. He also hedged his answer to a question on whether he would accept the results of the forthcoming election.

Here are the big moments from the most consequential night of the 2024 race.

Biden forgot his lines 

Joe Biden struggles through a line during his first debate of 2024 against Donald Trump

We have 1,000 trillionaires in America-- I mean, billionaires in America. And what's happening? They're in a situation where they, in fact, pay 8.2% in taxes. If they just pay 24%, 25%, either one of those numbers, they'd raise $500 million-- billion dollars, I should say, in a 10-year period.

We'd be able to wipe out this debt. We'd be able to help make sure that all those things we need to do-- child care, elder care, making sure that we continue to strengthen our health care system, making sure that we're able to make every single solitary person eligible for what I've been able to do with the COVID-- excuse me-- with dealing with everything we have to do with-- look, if we finally beat Medicare--

Joe Biden struggles through a line during his first debate of 2024 against Donald Trump © CNN

The president was under huge pressure to show he remained fit for office, and the debate was billed as an opportunity to allay concerns about his age and reprise his strong State of the Union delivery in March.

He repeatedly struggled through answers and tried to connect disjointed themes. In one example, he lost his train of thought and called billionaires trillionaires.

He also struggled on abortion

The candidates discuss abortion rights but Joe Biden quickly veers off to immigration

The problem they have is they're radical because they will take the life of a child in the eighth month, the ninth month, and even after birth. After birth. If you look at the former governor of Virginia, he was willing to do this. He said, we'll put the baby aside and we'll determine what we do with the baby, meaning we'll kill the baby. What happened is we brought it back to the states and the country is now coming together on this issue. It's been a great thing.

Thank you. President Biden.

It's been a terrible thing what you've done. The fact is that the vast majority of constitutional scholars supported Roe when it was decided, supported Roe. And that was-- that's-- this idea that they were all against it, it's just ridiculous. And this is a guy who says the state should be able to have it-- we're a state where in six weeks, you don't even know whether you're pregnant or not, but you cannot see a doctor, have your-- and have him decide on what your circumstances are, whether you need help.

The idea that states are able to do this is a little like saying, we're going to turn civil rights back to the states. Let each state have a different rule. Look, there are so many young women who have been, including a young woman who just was murdered, and he went to the funeral. The idea that she was murdered by an immigrant coming in to talk about that. But here's the deal, there's a lot of young women to be raped by their in-laws, by their spouses, brothers and sisters, by just-- it's just ridiculous. And they can do nothing about it. And they try to arrest them when they crossed state lines.

Thank you.

The candidates discuss abortion rights but Joe Biden quickly veers off to immigration © CNN

Biden had an early opportunity to hit Trump on abortion rights, a strong issue for Democrats and a weak point for the Republican ex-president.

Instead, Biden quickly veered off abortion to immigration — a weakness for the Democrat — meandering through an answer without delivering a forceful line about protecting reproductive rights.

Trump hedged his answer on accepting the election result

Donald Trump says he will accept the result if the race is a 'fair, legal and good election'

President Trump. The question was, will you accept the results of the election regardless of who wins? Yes or no, please.

If it's a fair and legal and good election, absolutely. I would have much rather accepted these. But the fraud and everything else was ridiculous. And if you want, we'll have a news conference on it in a week, or we'll have another one of these in a week. But I will absolutely-- there's nothing I'd rather do. It would be much easier for me to do that than I'm running again.

I wasn't really going to run until I saw the horrible job he did. He's destroying our country. I would be very happy to be someplace else in a nice location someplace, and again, no indictments, no political opponent stuff, because it's the only way he thinks he can win. But unfortunately, it's driven up my numbers and driven them up to a very high level, because the people understand it.

Donald Trump says he will accept the result if the race is a 'fair, legal and good election' © CNN

Trump minimised the January 6 2021 attack on the US Capitol by his supporters who were seeking — as he was — to overturn the 2020 presidential election result.

The former president was asked directly by CNN moderator Dana Bash three times whether he would accept the results of the coming election.

Trump initially ducked the question before offering a hedged answer that he would accept the result if it was a “fair, legal and good election”, even as he repeated false claims about fraud in the 2020 vote. Biden called him a “whiner”.

The men attacked each other’s character

The candidates trade blows over each other's character

The crimes that you are still charged with, and think of all the civil penalties you have. How many billions of dollars do you owe in civil penalties for molesting a woman in public, for doing a whole range of things, of having sex with a porn star on the night while your wife was pregnant? I mean, what are you talking about? You have the morals of an alley cat.

I'll give you a minute, sir.

I didn't have sex with a porn star.

The candidates trade blows over each other's character © CNN

Things got personal. The president berated Trump for his “crimes” and the “billions of dollars” in civil penalties he owed for “doing a whole range of things [like] having sex with a porn star while your wife was pregnant”.

Trump, who is facing penalties in the hundreds of millions of dollars, retorted: “I didn’t have sex with a porn star.”

The men also clashed over veterans and Trump’s alleged comments about dead soldiers being “suckers”. Trump denied saying this.

“My son was not a loser, he was not a sucker,” Biden said, referring to his dead son Beau, who served in Iraq. “You’re the sucker. You’re the loser,” Biden told his rival.

They argued about golf

The candidates argue over golf

You can see he is 6 foot 5" and only 223 pounds, or 235 pounds.

Never said it was [INAUDIBLE].

Well, you said 6' 4", 200--

I never said [INAUDIBLE].

Well, anyway, that's it. Anyway, just take a look at what he says he is and take a look at what he is. Look, I'd be happy to have a driving contest with him. I got my handicap, which when I was vice president, down to a 6. And by the way, I told you before, I'm happy to play golf if you carry your own bag. Think you can do it?

That's the biggest lie, that he's a 6 handicap, of all.

I was an 8 handicap.

Yeah, 8.

Ever.

But you know how many--

I've seen you swing. I know your swing.

'Let's not act like children': the two argue over golf © CNN

When the moderators asked the candidates about concerns over their fitness to serve, their responses descended into a squabble over golf.

Trump said he took two cognitive tests and “aced” them, adding that Biden “can’t hit a ball 50 yards”.

Biden mentioned Trump’s weight and said he would be “happy to play golf if you carry your own bag, think you can do it?” Trump responded: “Let’s not act like children.”

They blamed each other for inflation

The candidates clash over inflation

And he caused the inflation. He's blaming inflation. And he's right. It's been very bad. He caused the inflation. And it's killing Black families, and Hispanic families, and just about everybody. It's killing people. They can't buy groceries anymore. They can't. You look at the cost of food, where it's doubled, and tripled, and quadrupled. They can't live. They're not living anymore. He caused this inflation. I gave him a country with no-- essentially, no inflation. It was perfect. It was so good. All he had to do was leave it alone.

He destroyed it with his Green New Scam and all of the other-- all this money that's being thrown out the window. He caused inflation, as sure as you're sitting there. The fact is that his big kill on the Black people is the millions of people that he's allowed to come in through the border. They're taking black jobs now. And it could be 18, it could be 19 and even 20 million people. They're taking Black jobs and they're taking Hispanic jobs. And you haven't seen it yet, but you're going to see something that's going to be the worst in our history.

Thank you. President Biden?

There was no inflation when I became president. You know why? The economy was flat on its back, 15% unemployment. He decimated the economy, absolutely decimated the economy. That's why there was no inflation at the time. There were no jobs. We provided thousands of millions of jobs for individuals who were in all communities, including minority communities.

The candidates clash over inflation © CNN

Biden and Trump clashed over who was to blame for inflation soaring in recent years.

Biden “caused the inflation, and it’s killing Black families and Hispanic families and just about everyone”, claimed Trump. “They can’t buy groceries any more, they look at the cost of food where it’s doubled, tripled and quadrupled.”

Biden pointed to the strength of the economy under his presidency, including rapid job creation, and said he was working to drive down prices.

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