The vice president spends much of her time disparaging Trump's character by referring to his legal troubles, rather than forthrightly defending the immigration policy decisions being criticized. While Trump may merit criticism, Harris fails to engage with the substantive issues raised by the debate moderators about the timing and nature of the Biden-Harris administration's border security efforts.

1. red herring • Instead of addressing why the Biden-Harris administration waited until 6 months before the election to act on immigration, Harris pivots to boasting about her past prosecutions prior to becoming Vice President:

MUIR: ...my question to you tonight is why did the administration wait until six months before the election to act [on immigration] and would you have done anything differently from President Biden on this?

VICE PRESIDENT KAMALA HARRIS: So I'm the only person on this stage who has prosecuted transnational criminal organizations for the trafficking of guns, drugs, and human beings...

This is a red herring, distracting from the original question. In the same response, she goes on to mention what Congress tried to do on immigration, still avoiding why the White House delayed acting within its executive powers. And then she continues with yet another red herring topic:

And I'm going to actually do something really unusual and I'm going to invite you to attend one of Donald Trump's rallies because it's a really interesting thing to watch. You will see during the course of his rallies he talks about fictional characters like Hannibal Lecter.

Harris never actually answers the direct question posed to her about the delayed immigration actions. Her response is a clear attempt to change the subject and divert attention away from having to explain the timing and reasoning behind those policy decisions.

2. slippery slope with appeal to fear • Just as she did in her DNC acceptance speech, Harris takes the Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity for official acts and uses it to make the slippery slope argument that this will inevitably lead to Trump having "no guardrails" and being able to exercise power without any constraints or accountability.

The United States Supreme Court recently ruled that the former president would essentially be immune from any misconduct if he were to enter the White House again... Understand what it would mean if Donald Trump were back in the White House with no guardrails. Because certainly, we know now the court won't stop him.

The court's decision was specifically about immunity for "official acts" carried out as part of the president's constitutional duties. It did not grant any president full blanket immunity from all criminal prosecution as Harris implies.

The court wrote:

"Under our constitutional structure of separated powers, the nature of Presidential power entitles a former President to absolute immunity from criminal prosecution for actions within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority. And he is entitled to at least presumptive immunity from prosecution for all his official acts. There is no immunity for unofficial acts."

By stating "certainly, we know now the court won't stop him," Harris is mischaracterizing and exaggerating the scope of the ruling. This allows her to then raise the ominous specter "if Donald Trump were back in the White House with no guardrails" as if he would be completely unrestrained by the threat of prosecution.

This is a misleading characterization used for alarmist rhetoric, rather than an accurate representation of the Supreme Court's ruling on presidential immunity.