As Harris and Trump debated, a social media battle raged

By Stephanie Kelly

NEW YORK (Reuters) -While tens of millions of Americans tuned in to watch the debate between Republican Donald Trump and Democratic nominee Kamala Harris on their television screens on Tuesday, a secondary battle played out on social media through clips and video edits of memorable debate moments.

Social media users were off from the opening moment of the debate, with Democrats seizing the moment Harris walked across the stage to shake Trump's hand and introduce herself.

"Kamala said you’re gonna shake my hand dammit!" social media user Adam James Smith posted on X, to 40,000 likes.

Part of Vice President Harris' debate plan was to goad Trump into saying things that could become viral social media clips, advisers said earlier, and the debate suggested that strategy paid off.

Supporters circulated images of Harris' sometimes bemused, sometimes skeptical facial expressions as Trump cycled through a series of familiar falsehoods and repeated a false conspiracy that Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio, were eating pet dogs and cats.

"THEY'RE EATING THE DOGS," quickly trended on social media platform X, buoyed by thousands of posts - including many confused at the quote's relevance in a presidential debate, after Trump said "They're eating the dogs, the people that came in, they're eating the cats."

Trump supporters, meanwhile, jumped on his response as he discussed Harris' economic plan, saying it was simplistic and copied her boss President Joe Biden's agenda. "Run, Spot, run," he said, referring to a popular childrens' book series used to teach kids to read in decades past. Social media is playing an even more significant role in this year's election cycle than it has in the past, political strategists say. Both the Democratic and Republican parties have drafted content creators, or influencers, to push information on their party's policies and their candidates.

Overall, Trump outperforms Harris and her campaign on X and TikTok based on followers. The Harris campaign's official Kamala HQ account has 1.3 million followers on X, compared to Trump's 2.4 million. However, her campaign has received over 100 million "likes" on its videos on TikTok versus Trump's 44 million.

(Reporting by Stephanie Kelly; Editing by Heather Timmons and Deepa Babington)