‘Tell Donald. I want him to know it was me.’: An absurd debate calls for absurd memes

I sat down to the first Harris/Trump debate of the 2024 election ready to hear some solid policy ideas. Instead, I got … concepts.

Thanks to Harris’ ability to keep cool under pressure, we did get to some policy matters which she just recently published in full to her website. For the most part, we just got an earful of the usual word salad from Trump. Someone tell him this is not what conservatives mean when they talk about “mad libs.”

I wasn’t alone in thinking this debate was a mess. It is what it is. Thank goodness, the internet is always ready to turn a messy performance into comedy gold. Here’s a few of the best meme trends from the night, where the consensus was Harris trounced him.

If I send you this …

Between the lies, the absurd answers, and Trump’s inability to control his tone, Kamala Harris’ face went through a journey. To be fair, my face went on almost the exact same journey, so I completely understand. The first memes I saw trending were this format of showing a picture of the various faces we saw throughout the night and the translation.

Kamala’s face spoke volumes.

It wasn’t just Kamala’s face though. Linsey Davis’ face also had its own translation team.

THEY’RE EATING THE DOGS!

I feel like this one needs some context. Trump spent a lot of time talking about immigration in this debate. Specifically, he spent his time parroting baseless lies and racism about immigrants. If you didn’t see the debate, check out this bewildering clip where Trump makes the claim that immigrants are eating pets and David Muir factchecks on the spot:

I know. Wild. Let’s get into the memes.

“THEY’RE EATING THE DOGS!” was clearly not on anyone’s BINGO card.

There is probably a Simpsons image for any occasion.

Cover your fur babies ears. They don’t need to hear this.

And a prayer circle for Snoop Dogg as well. Just in case.

Concepts of a plan

Trump has been an critic of “Obamacare” and has been saying for the past nine years that he would make a plan that is better and less expensive to replace it. When asked during the debate what this big plan was, Trump responded, “I have concepts of a plan.” So basically … no. He doesn’t have a plan to make healthcare more accessible for the American people. Shocker.

What is “concepts of a plan”? Is that even a thing? The internet has some ideas! Let’s see some examples.

Actually, “Concepts of a plan” isn’t a bad spin. We might be able to use that.

Honestly, flan is probably preferable to whatever plan he could’ve come up with.

We may not have answers to burning questions after the debate, but we do have laughter and each other.

And Doug. Don’t forget Doug.

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Lauren Salerno

Lauren Salerno is a contributing writer at The Mary Sue. She is a literary citizen of Los Angeles and has been involved with such projects as the Shades & Shadows Reading Series, the Omega Sci-Fi Project, and The Seers' Table column of the Horror Writers Association blog. Some of her words can be found in places like the Los Angeles Times, the Office of Intellectual Freedom Blog, and The Rattling Wall. She holds a Master's Degree in Library and Information Science and stays up late at night skimming digital archives for fun. There is a special place in her heart for horror, Star Wars, and reality television. She can frequently be found haunting the halls of convention centers, perhaps moderating a panel or two. Follow her on most social media channels: @paranormalauren.