Sarah Longwell and John Fetterman React to Thursday’s Debate

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: But what do you think about the health issue? The debate moderator raised that question first, COVID, and the response to it and these 220,000 deaths. Do you agree that it’s just a referendum or that it’s a big issue?

SARAH LONGWELL, FOUNDER, REPUBLICAN VOTERS AGAINST TRUMP: No, I think it is a referendum, but I also think that there is a dominant issue in this election, and that is the coronavirus. You know, I do focus groups all the time with 2016 Trump voters. And the fact is, his handling of the coronavirus has damaged him tremendously with his own people. Because the fact is, look, what people care about — so, I always ask people, how do you think things are going in the country? And people say they’re going really bad. Their lives have been upended by this virus. And so, they are looking for somebody to give them a plan to speak to their lives. And so, when Donald Trump goes on and on about Hunter Biden’s hard drive, that’s not talking to things that matter to real people. The things that they are experiencing in their lives. And it’s not just the virus, it’s the attending economic crisis. I mean, if you look at polls and you ask, what matters to you in this election? And people say two things, they say the economy and they say COVID. And on both of those issues, you know, Donald Trump is doing very badly going into the last 11 days of this election.

FETTERMAN: Yes, I don’t know —

AMANPOUR: I want to play — Lieutenant Governor, can I just play the soundbites and I’ll get you to comment on it because it’s specifically about COVID?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: It will go away. And as I say, we’re rounding the turn, we’re rounding the corner. It’s going away.

JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Anyone who’s responsible for that many deaths should not remain as president of the United States of America.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AMANPOUR: So, Lieutenant Governor, you know, how do you think that sat with the voters in your state?

FETTERMAN: Yes. I think most voters are lumping it all in chaos. It’s like, do you enjoy the daily churn and the chaos and the news cycle swaying on a single tweet in this kind of fatigue has set in? And if you want more of that, you have a vote to make. And if you reject that, off vote to make. But coronavirus, in many respects also, is not — the way I would describe it is, is that the people that are voting for Donald Trump, they don’t see that as the key defining issue. They see other things. So of course, the president’s handling of the coronavirus has damaged him in some circles, but in Pennsylvania, he still remains popular. And I would not take anything for granted here in Pennsylvania with respects to it regardless of what the poll says because it’s going to continue to tighten, I believe, over the next 10 days.