Tuesday’s Vice Presidential debate sparked a small interest for SMU students and viewers across the U.S. While 67 million viewers watched Trump and Harris, only 43 million viewers tuned in to listen to Vance and Walz debate.

Exclamations of excitement died down as members of the College Democrats prepared for the start of the debate Tuesday night in Hughes Trigg. With a small group of nine, and their fudge stripe cookies and untouched Red Bulls, the group watched nominee and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz in action for the first time on the national stage.

Before the debate students shared their own personal political thoughts and opinions with one another while also reminiscing on the previous Presidential debate. They were interested to see how Walz performed against Republican Senator nominee J.D. Vance. Some members expected Vance to continue his streak bringing up false claims of Haitian migrants eating pets in Springfield, Ohio.

“I’m expecting a good debate,” Sam Rodick, president of the SMU College Democrats said. “I’m really excited to see Tim Walz perform. I’m expecting J.D. Vance to be himself and say some things that are a little insane, but I’m hopeful that Tim Walz can try to steer the conversation back to the American people.”

Across campus, SMU’s debate coach and faculty advisor, stood alone at the head of McCord Auditorium in Dallas Hall. Ben Voth, Ph.D. had just finished his C-span interview in the SMU parking lot to walk into the mostly empty auditorium where the debate club was scheduled to watch the vice presidential debate.

“Typically you don’t see a large turnout for vice presidential debates as much as presidential debates,” Ross Sloan, a lecturer in the English department and assistant faculty advisor to the debate program said.

The debate began with a lengthy question regarding war in the Middle East, and some college democrats in Hughes Trigg were upset with the opening question. They wished for something like the economy or a question that allowed the candidates to introduce themselves to the American people.

“Open with like, how are you feeling? Just introduce yourself,” a member from SMU College Democrats said.

Despite neither of the presidential candidates being on stage, both were a big presence in the debate. Senator Vance attacked Harris’s policies and actions.

“If Kamala Harris and her leadership, if they really believe that climate change is serious, what they would be doing is more manufacturing and more energy production in the United States of America. And that’s not what they’re doing.” In regards to the Southern border, he claimed “We have a historic immigration crisis because Kamala Harris…wanted to undo all of Donald Trump’s border policies” and because of her current border policies she “led in fentanyl into our communities

Governor Walz criticized Trump’s leadership, policies and character.

“It’s those that were closest to Donald Trump that understand how dangerous he is…His chief of staff, John Kelly said that he was the most flawed human being he’d ever met, and both Secretaries of Defense and his national security advisors said he should be nowhere near the White House,” Walz said.

At one moment Walz even threw Trump’s running mate, Vance, under the bus claiming that Vance once said “[Trump] he’s unfit for the highest office.”

Trump was also the topic of conversation among the watch party.

“The Republican Party, for years, decades, trying to be the party of family values, made this guy a freaking Messiah…he has five kids with three different wives,” Madison McLean said.

But the group turned its attendance to Vance, with one person saying he looked like he had “no life in his eyes anymore.”

At one point, a chuckle came from one of the two attendants in Dallas Hall when official CBS debate moderators Margaret Brennan and Norah O’Donnell cut Vance’s mic during an extended answer about his false claims in Springfield, Ohio.

Paul Wuller, a member of the debate team, sat in the empty auditorium taking in what the candidates were saying.

“I like this way more than the presidential debate,” Wuller said. “It feels like they’re discussing important stuff instead of attacking the other person.”

As the night went on, the SMU College Democrats watch party slowly began to feel less like a debate watch party and more like a group political discussion with the debate in the background. Interjections were constantly made throughout the night, with any candidate’s response being a gateway to the next topic the group would discuss. But, when the question on abortion was posed the room went silent. During Walz’s response, all eyes were fixated on the TV with few comments.

As the College Democrats members began to pack up before closing statements, members discussed how they thought the night went. The overall opinion was that they thought that the debate results were pretty even with no clear winner.

“I was impressed with his [Walz] performance overall, the way he presented himself and his issues, without taking too much of a…negative stance towards Vance and Trump,” student Caroline Stewart said. “I was actually really impressed with Vance’s performance… he came across with more empathy and more knowledge of policies than I expected.”

Stewart was unsure of who won the debate.

“I think part of that would come from the post debate analysis. I think they both did well,” Stewart said.

After the debate, Voth opened the floor for student discussion in McCord Auditorium. Although Wuller was the only student left by the time the debate had finished, he and Voth thought the candidates covered a lot of topics during the debate and presented themselves well.

Being a debate expert, Voth scored the candidates during the debate. He evaluated each answer the candidates gave on a 100-point scale.

“I imagine myself as an interested undecided voter and consider the delivery and substance of their appeal in each episode,” Voth said. “The spreadsheet contains about 40 to 80 graded interactions. The scores are averaged for each candidate. It becomes the basis of my assessment and also allows me to look at discrete exchanges.”

Voth said both candidates scored strong. Vance was strong at the beginning of the debate and Waltz was strong at the end, he said. But one thing that shocked even Voth was that both candidates scored in the 90 percentile.

“I’ve scored a lot of these,” Voth said. “Rarely are both of them in the 90 percentile area.”