Kamala Harris and Donald Trump will debate in September | The Excerpt

On Friday’s episode of The Excerpt podcast: Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump will debate in September. USA TODAY Pentagon Correspondent Tom Vanden Brook discusses why the Trump campaign is going after Harris running mate Tim Walz’s military history. Are you getting headaches after Tropical Storm Debby? There’s a likely cause. USA TODAY Personal Finance Reporter Daniel de Visé discusses shoplifting. Giant pandas go on display at San Diego Zoo. Plus, check out our episode on panda diplomacy. From track & field to basketball and beach volleyball, it’s another big day at the Paris games!
Hit play on the player below to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript beneath it. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.
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Taylor Wilson:
Good morning. I’m Taylor Wilson, and today is Friday, August 9th, 2024. This is the Excerpt. Today, Trump and Harris have agreed to debate, plus Harris’ running mate Tim Walsh’s military background is under fire, and shoplifting is more common than you think.
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Former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris said yesterday that they plan to debate on September 10th. Trump’s campaign also put forth debate dates of September 4th and September 25th with details to be worked out with the Harris campaign. About the debate and potential further debates, Trump told reporters, “I think they’ll be very revealing.” And Harris told reporters about the September date, “I hear he’s finally committed to it, and I’m looking forward to it.” As for the possibility of other debates, Harris said she’s happy to have the conversation about an additional debate. ABC News, which had previously scheduled a debate between Trump and President Joe Biden said it will host the September 10th debate. In recent days, Trump had suggested he might withdraw from the ABC agreement because of conflicts with the network and the fact that Biden has withdrawn from the race and Harris has stepped in.
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Democratic Vice Presidential candidate Tim Walsh’s National Guard Service is under the microscope and has become an immediate target of former President Donald Trump’s campaign. I spoke with USA TODAY Pentagon correspondent Tom Vanden Brook for more.
Tom, thanks for hopping on.
Tom Vanden Brook:
Taylor, good to be here.
Taylor Wilson:
Always good having you, Tom. So let’s just start with this. What do we know about Governor Tim Walsh’s military background and what has he himself said about it?
Tom Vanden Brook:
We know that he was in the National Guard. He enlisted at age 17, and that helped him pay GI bill for college. He served for 24 years. He attained the rank of Command Sergeant Major, but he didn’t retire at that rank because he did not complete coursework for it. So there’s a little bit of controversy about that though not much in that he retired as a master sergeant. The bigger part of the controversy is, according to the Trump campaign, and in particular the vice presidential nominee, that he has exaggerated his service and claimed what they say is stolen valor, that he made claims that he served in combat when he didn’t. It’s a bit of a stretch to say that.
Taylor Wilson:
I want to hear a little bit more about kind of what the Trump campaign approach is here. As you mentioned, Trump’s running mate, JD Vance in particular is talking about this timeline of Walsh’s retirement from the National Guard and how it stacks up with the war in Iraq. How have they gone on the offensive here, Tom, and what is he saying about that timeline?
Tom Vanden Brook:
Right. They’re citing some of Walsh’s former comrades in his unit in the Minnesota National Guard who have said that Walz retired before they deployed to Iraq for a tough deployment in 2005, and that he saw it coming and ducked out. That’s what they claim, and the timeline shows that he retired in 2005, but that was two months before his unit was mobilized for Iraq. There are indications, however, that the unit knew that there was a deployment coming up. He acknowledges that too in some ways. So that’s the issue, how you characterize it. Others look at that record, including a Senior National Guard [inaudible 00:03:36] official at the time said it was not unusual at all for a National Guard soldier with 24 years in as Walz was at the time and in his forties to retire. The previous year, his unit had deployed, not to combat, it deployed to Europe. So Walz said he wanted to retire so he could run for Congress, which he did and won.
Taylor Wilson:
And Tom, we should clarify, JD Vance has his own military history. Can you fill in folks on that if they’re not aware?
Tom Vanden Brook:
Sure. JD Vance went through boot camp, which is no picnic for the Marines, and he served in the Marine Corps and deployed to Iraq at the height of the Iraq war when the Marines were in Anbar Province, primarily, in Western Iraq. There was bad fighting there. It should be said that he was a public affairs marine at the time and was mostly on a base. But nonetheless, those bases, Al Asad where he was, were regularly rocketed. It was not a good place to be.
Taylor Wilson:
And has Governor Walsh or the Kamala Harris campaign responded to any of these criticisms?
Tom Vanden Brook:
A little bit. They have not really directly taken on some of these issues. They point to his service record and the dates and when he retired, and that was well before the mobilization of his unit. They also have addressed one of the criticisms that Walz at one point said he carried weapons he took to war. Well, he never was in combat, so was he overstating that? That’s a fair read of it. But he was an artilleryman. He certainly carried a weapon at some point. He was familiar with cannons. You can judge that as you might.
Taylor Wilson:
Tom, this isn’t the first time that sort of a history of military service has come up in the political world, especially in election cycles. How have we seen this issue come up before in past elections?
Tom Vanden Brook:
Very recently, Taylor. We may remember not that long ago that former President Trump had five deferments from the Vietnam war. Four of those were academic and one was, as the New York Times reported, for apparently bone spurs in his foot. At the same time, President Biden also had five deferments. Now these were Vietnam era guys, right? Biden had four deferments for academic reasons as well and one for… I believe it was asthma. So it’s not unusual at all to have military records questioned or to have them scrutinized, certainly at this level.
Taylor Wilson:
Tom Walsh made the military a pretty big part of his first speech. As Harris’ running mate earlier this week he talked about the GI bill and veterans. How do we expect the military broadly to play out as a theme during the rest of this election cycle? And might any of this pushback from the Trump campaign change how Waltz himself talks about his own military history ?
Tom Vanden Brook:
That remains to be seen. It’s not as though he didn’t serve. He’s been there for 24 years, and he has made a point of noting it’s part of his story. He was a National Guardsman for 24 years. He also makes central to his biography the fact that he was a high school teacher and a football coach. So this isn’t the only sort of identity that he’s running on. I know a lot of people will remember back in 2004 that John Kerry, of course, he served in the Senate at that point, but he made a big point during the Iraq war at the time that he was a Vietnam war veteran and was a decorated navy sailor.
Taylor Wilson:
Great breakdown on all this for us. Tom Vanden Brook covers the Pentagon for USA TODAY. Thank you, Tom.
Tom Vanden Brook:
Thanks, Taylor.
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Taylor Wilson:
Are you getting headaches after Tropical Storm Debbie? There may be a reason for that, and it’s not just the stress associated with Debbie’s continuous rainfall. Sudden barometric pressure changes during tropical systems can cause sinus pressure, resulting in a chemical imbalance and headache. The Nebraska University Health Center says barometric pressure is the weight of the air. The pressure is higher when it’s dry and lower when wet. The humidity associated with a tropical system often plummets barometric pressure quickly, causing quick changes to sinus pressure. Tropical Storm Debbie was expected to produce up to eight inches of rain across parts of the East Coast through yesterday, with some 19 million people under a flood watch at one point.
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Shoplifting is more common than you think. I discussed new survey findings with USA TODAY personal finance reporter, Daniel de Vise.
Hey there, Daniel.
Daniel De Vise:
Hey, good to be here.
Taylor Wilson:
Thanks for hopping on. So let’s just start with this, Daniel. How common is shoplifting according to this new survey?
Daniel De Vise:
Well, I didn’t know until I read this new survey because I’ve never seen data on this before, but it says that around one quarter of adults sort of fess up to having shoplifted. This is according to LendingTree.
Taylor Wilson:
And how often do shoplifters get caught?
Daniel De Vise:
Around half said that they’d been caught. Isn’t that amazing? 48% of the people who said they had shoplifted had been caught in the act at some point.
Taylor Wilson:
Wow. So I’m always curious with this, Daniel, what are the driving motives behind shoplifting and what are the items people usually steal?
Daniel De Vise:
Some of this is kind of self-evident. We all know people, maybe ourselves from childhood who did this on a dare or to get a thrill. I think some of this thrill-seeking that attends shoplifting endures into adulthood, and that’s where you get into your Britney Spears and your Winona Ryder. Both of them have been accused of shoplifting kind of famously. It can also signal psychological problems like depression. It can be a cry for help. And this is the poignant thing is for many people, especially in today’s economy, it can be because they’re broke and just can’t afford basic items. That was what came out loud and clear in this new survey.
Taylor Wilson:
So Daniel, I think we’ve all had experiences at this point with these self-checkout machines. They can be annoying and frustrating, I think, for many folks, but at some stores it’s really the only way to buy your items. I think of the pharmacy chains especially.
Daniel De Vise:
Feels like it.
Taylor Wilson:
Yeah, right? Does this encourage shoplifting Daniel or make it easier?
Daniel De Vise:
Well, that’s a complicated question. The retailers also have a complicated relationship with self-checkout. They’ve been pulling back on it this year, and USA TODAY has reported that some of the big chain stores, I think Target is one, Dollar General, and they’re talking about theft, switching price tags around and other misdeeds as well as legitimate concern about customer experience. I’ll tell you this, LendingTree who did this survey on shoplifting, they do see a connection. The reason they did this survey was they did an earlier survey about self-checkout, and 69% of the people surveyed said that they believed that the technology of checkout makes it easier to steal.
Taylor Wilson:
So how much does this actually hurt the stores, Daniel? Can they sustain this level of shoplifting? And what sorts of changes are they making to try and prevent it?
Daniel De Vise:
The most common shoplifted things are pretty small things. Food, non-alcoholic drinks. That kind of surprised me. Wouldn’t you want to steal an expensive bottle of booze or something? So a lot of it’s small stuff, but we can’t take it for granted because the industry, the retail industry lost 112 billion in 2022, the most recent year available for shrink, which is not just shoplifting, but also employee theft. And it also covers this big deal organized retail crime that’s like shoplifting on a vast scale. So it’s a big deal, and this is partly why prices are going up. It’s not just because of inflation, it’s also because of shrink.
Taylor Wilson:
Interesting findings. De Vise covers personal finance for USA TODAY. Thank you, Daniel.
Daniel De Vise:
Thank you.
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Taylor Wilson:
We’re into the final three days of the Summer Olympics in Paris, following a banner day on Thursday. After winning gold in the a hundred meter dash American sprinter Noah Lyles returned to the track for the 200-meter dash, but Lyles as a heavy favorite had to settle for bronze, finishing behind fellow American Kenny Bednarek, who earned silver, and Botswana’s Letsile Tebogo, who grabbed gold. It was later revealed that Lyles tested positive for COVID on Tuesday, but still opted to go through with the race. There’s still no word on whether the positive COVID test will prevent Lyles from participating in the 4 by 100 meter relay finals, which are set for this afternoon. Also yesterday, the U.S. men’s basketball team held off a scare from Serbia to advance to the gold medal game. It’ll take on the hosts France on Saturday in the final. The U.S. women have their semi-final set for today against Australia. Also today, women’s beach volleyball is set to conclude with bronze and gold medal matches. You can follow along with USA TODAY Sports.
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A pair of giant pandas that arrived in San Diego from China a little more than a month ago have finally debuted and are now on display for the public at San Diego Zoo. Yun Chuan and Xin Bao were the first pandas to enter the United States in 21 years and were unveiled to the public in a grand ceremony yesterday. For more on pandas and panda diplomacy, check out our special deep dive episode from earlier this summer. We have a link in today’s show notes.
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And thanks for listening to The Excerpt. We’re produced by Shannon Rae Green, and our executive producer is Laura Beatty. You can get the podcast wherever you get your audio, and if you’re on a smart speaker, just ask for The Excerpt. I’m Taylor Wilson and I’ll be back tomorrow with more of The Excerpt from USA TODAY.