Scott Brown explains Donald Trump’s sniffles during the first presidential debate
"That's a mechanism that I've used; I don't do it as pronounced as he does."
Donald Trump’s sniffling garnered widespread attention during the first presidential debate, as well as a few unsubstantiated theories.
Following the debate, Trump attributed the alleged sniffles to microphone issues. But former Massachusetts Sen. Scott Brown has an alternative explanation.
“He was nervous,” Brown said Tuesday in a Boston Herald Radio interview.
“I could tell he was nervous by the breathing, kind of [exaggerated sniffle] deep breaths in. That’s a mechanism that I’ve used; I don’t do it as pronounced as he does.”
https://soundcloud.com/bostonherald/scott-brown-joins-morning-meeting-1
Brown, who is a Trump supporter, conceded that Hillary Clinton won the debate. But he said Clinton, despite her experience in debates, also felt the pressure of the moment.
“And then her kind of shaking and wiggling, she was nervous too,” Brown said, in an apparent reference to Clinton’s mid-debate shimmy. “They were both nervous.”
“The fact that she didn’t blow him out of the water I thought was a real positive,” he added.
Post-debate polls also found that voters, by a wide margin, thought Clinton did best at last Monday’s debate.
The former Massachusetts senator-turned-New Hampshire resident said Clinton won “by a hair or maybe a little bit more.” Compared to the Senate debates he had with Martha Coakley and Elizabeth Warren, Brown said the questions both candidates received were “softballs.”
As for the next debate, Brown was asked whether Trump would take a cue from his running mate, Mike Pence, who reportedly started preparing for Tuesday night’s vice presidential debate since he was asked join the ticket.
“I certainly hope so,” he said. “I mean, I and others suggested to Donald that he handle things a certain way.”
The New York Times reported last week that campaign advisers are working to institute a more rigorous debate prep strategy for Trump, though they are concerned whether he will agree to it.
“He’s a pretty quick learner,” Brown said Tuesday. ” He’s not going to make the same mistake twice.”
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