--- title: Donald Trump Gives Hillary Clinton a C+ for Debate description: Donald Trump gave Hillary Clinton a C+ grade for her debate performance, but declined to give himself a score canonical: https://time.com/4509300/donald-trump-hillary-clinton-presidential-debate-grade/ author: Zeke Miller article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-09-27T12:10:21.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-10-07T06:48:29.604Z article:section: Politics og:title: Donald Trump Gives Hillary Clinton a C+ for Debate og:description: Donald Trump gave Hillary Clinton a C+ grade for her debate performance, but declined to give himself a score og:url: https://time.com/4509300/donald-trump-hillary-clinton-presidential-debate-grade/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltaa37169324261130/6988a7a70a4a2245db9cb6ac/trump_post_debate.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3500 og:image:height: 1969 og:image:alt: trump_debate og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Donald Trump Gives Hillary Clinton a C+ for Debate twitter:description: Donald Trump gave Hillary Clinton a C+ grade for her debate performance, but declined to give himself a score twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltaa37169324261130/6988a7a70a4a2245db9cb6ac/trump_post_debate.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Donald Trump Gives Hillary Clinton a C+ Grade for Debate Performance > Sponsored content. 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Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-network-2026q3/newsletters?i=3eb4ff75-cfa6-4961-8f36-10220bc7ab97&cr=time-nl-network-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Donald Trump To Hillary: "I Want You To Be Happy" [Watch (HLS stream): Donald Trump To Hillary: "I Want You To Be Happy"](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/puXMDTo5.m3u8) (0:26)  _Published 2016-09-27. Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump squared off at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y., Monday for the first of three presidential debates_ by [Zeke Miller](https://time.com/author/zeke-j-miller/) ## Zeke Miller Sep 27, 2016 12:10 PM UTC by [Zeke Miller](https://time.com/author/zeke-j-miller/) ## Zeke Miller Sep 27, 2016 12:10 PM UTC Donald Trump gave Hillary Clinton a C+ grade for her debate performance, but declined to give himself a score. The Republican presidential contender appeared on Fox and Friends the morning after the debate to give his thoughts on the first presidential debate at Hofstra University on Monday night. Most pundits have hailed Clinton as the narrow winner of a closely-fought contest. Her performance improved as the night went on, Trump acknowledged, but only because of the moderators. “I thought she was very bad in the first half when they were asking normal questions,” he said, “and when they were asking bad questions she did better.” Trump said he had planned to hit Clinton on her husband Bill Clinton’s infidelities but had declined as he didn’t want to do it in front of their daughter Chelsea. “See, I do have a heart,” he said. The Republican’s repeated sniffing was noted by many viewers on social media, including onetime Democratic presidential candidate [Howard Dean who speculated Trump might have been on drugs](http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/09/27/trumps-sniffles-prompt-howard-dean-to-tweet-coke-user.html). The real estate mogul blamed the technology and said his health was not to blame. “No, no sniffles. The mic was very bad,” he said. “I had a problem with a microphone that didn’t work … I wonder, was it set up that way on purpose?” In the debate hall the microphone did indeed appear to have some kind of error, though it was not picked up by TV cameras. ## Transcript When we sell into Mexico, there's a tax, automatic 16 % approximately. When they sell into us, there's no tax. It's a defective agreement. It's been defective for a long time, many years. But the politicians haven't done anything about it. Now, in all fairness to Secretary Clinton Yes, is that Okay? Good. I want you to be very happy. 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