Harris speaks to race and political divisiveness

Analyzing the article

ABC News

straw man

Our Analysis: 1 Fallacy

I think it's a tragedy that we have someone who wants to be president who has consistently over the course of his career attempted to use race to divide the American people. You know, I do believe that the vast majority of us know that we have so much more in common than what separates us. And we don't want this kind of approach that is just constantly trying to divide us, and especially by race.

While Harris presents an uplifting vision of inclusive leadership and outlines some concrete policy proposals, she undermines her credibility by mischaracterizing details of the ad placed by Trump during the Central Park Five case, as well as omitting important context about the teenagers' confessions at the time.

1. straw man with cherry picking • Harris' statement regarding Trump's controversial full-page ad about the Central Park Five case overstates what the ad actually said.

Let's remember, this is the same individual who took out a full-page ad in The New York Times calling for the execution of five young Black and Latino boys who were innocent, the Central Park Five.

While Trump's ad did call for reinstating the death penalty in New York and was clearly motivated by that high-profile case, Harris' phrasing that he took out an ad "calling for the execution of five young Black and Latino boys who were innocent, the Central Park Five" is an inaccurate characterization.

The ad itself did not explicitly name those five individuals or directly call for their execution, as Harris states. It was more generally arguing for bringing back capital punishment, though the context makes clear it was a response to that case.

So Harris' statement conflates Trump's position and takes rhetorical license in a way that could be seen as a straw man fallacy - misrepresenting his action in an inaccurate way to makes it easier to condemn. A more precise characterization would have been warranted.

Even if Trump's ad was racially insensitive, Harris goes too far in claiming he directly called for the execution of the Central Park Five by name when the ad did not do so.

Additionally, at the time Trump took out that ad calling for reinstating the death penalty in New York, the five teenagers had confessed to the crime. Their innocence was not yet established. By stating they were "innocent, the Central Park Five" with no qualifications, Harris is removing the crucial context that based on the information available at that time, they had admitted to the rape and assault.

So not only does Harris mischaracterize Trump's ad itself, she is also cherry-picking facts by omitting the key detail that the five had confessed when Trump responded.

It's important to note that Trump's ad is very controversial to this day, and may have played a role in turning public opinion against five innocent teenagers. But the ad's content and the situation in which was created do not match what Harris' remark suggests.

References

Kamala Harris (2024, Sep 10). Harris on race and divisiveness: Topic #10 of the Presidential Debate of Sep. 10th, 2024.
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/harris-trump-presidential-debate-transcript/story?id=113560542

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Disclaimer

Note that there being one or more apparent fallacies in the arguments presented in this article does not mean that every argument the arguer made was fallacious, nor does it mean there are not other arguments in existence for the same or similar position that are logically valid. Also note that checking for fallacies is not the same as verification of the premises the arguer starts from, such as facts that the arguer asserts or principles that the arguer assumes as the foundation for constructing arguments. For more about this, see our 'What is Fallacy Checking?'

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