Gun policy got short shrift with just 56 days until Election Day as Kamala Harris and Donald Trump squared off on Tuesday night for the only scheduled debate against the two presidential candidates.

Trump's second debate of the cycle and Harris' first was at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in front of ABC moderators David Muir and Linsey Davis. While the moderators introduced questions on the economy, abortion rights, J-6, and other issues, they shied away from the polarizing question of Second Amendment rights and gun control – with one exception. 

Davis posed to Harris, "[I]n your last run for president you said you wanted to ban fracking. Now you don't. You wanted mandatory government buyback programs for assault weapons. Now your campaign says you don't. You supported decriminalizing border crossings. Now you're taking a harder line. I know you say that your values have not changed. So then why have so many of your policy positions changed?"

While Harris gave a flowing 400-word response, it lacked any reference to her current feelings toward past support of mandatory "assault weapon" turn-in programs. 

Further, Harris, whose official presidential campaign platform – announced the day before the debate – stands behind bans on "assault weapons and high-capacity magazines" as well as requiring universal background checks, and support of red flag laws, was mum on any mention of these policies in the debate. 

Trump managed to pivot back to the missed "buy back" question in a later response to Davis, saying, "She is destroying our country. She has a plan to defund the police. She has a plan to confiscate everybody's gun. She has a plan to not allow fracking in Pennsylvania or anywhere else. That's what her plan is until just recently."

To which Harris rebutted, "This business about taking everyone’s guns away – Tim Walz and I are both gun owners, we’re not taking anyone’s guns away." 

It should be noted that both Harris and Walz formally supported various gun bans, including "red flag" gun seizure laws and a more muscular reboot of the federal "assault weapon" ban while they were in Congress. Walz and Harris left their seats on Capitol Hill in 2019 and 2021, respectively. 

Trump managed to work guns into his closing statement, sandwiching, "She wants to confiscate your guns," between "She wants to do transgender operations on illegal aliens that are in prison," and "she will never allow fracking in Pennsylvania."