Undecided voters react to the final presidential debate
Go Deeper.
Create an account or log in to save stories.
Like this?
Thanks for liking this story! We have added it to a list of your favorite stories.
They've seen six hours worth of John McCain, Sarah Palin, Barack Obama, and Joe Biden.
It wasn't Joe the plumber that won him over, but Jeremy Bierlein isn't an undecided voter anymore.
"I am voting on the issues. Health care is important to me. Education is important to me."
Closing the budget deficit is important to him, too. And Bierlein was disappointed neither McCain nor Obama would say they'd give up some of their proposals in light of the sagging economy.
Turn Up Your Support
MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all.
"But based on health care, based on education and based on who I see the help going to in the near term for economic relief, I'm going for Obama," Bierlein said.
If our undecided voters were a representative sample of the population -- and let's be perfectly clear that they aren't -- then you'd have to say Obama won the debate.
Linda Dworsky came to all four of our debate watching parties. When she started she was leaning strongly toward McCain.
But now she's not.
"Over the period of coming to the debates and learning on my own, I've lost confidence in McCain and gained confidence in Obama." Dworsky used to worry Obama's health care plan would amount to a government-run single-payer insurance system like Canada has. But now she's comfortable that it's not.
She prefers it to McCain's plan to move Americans toward buying their own insurance rather than getting it through their employers.
She also likes the way Obama has been coming across in the debates.
"I found that McCain was smug and disrespectful toward Obama on several occasions and that turned me off."
Dworsky is still keeping an open mind. She isn't ready to call herself a decided voter, yet. But she's moving in that direction.
Her husband Rick isn't.
"I don't feel the pressure to make up my mind until the day of the election and I'm okay with that."
Rick Dworsky almost always waits until the last minute to choose a candidate. He has an almost judicial approach. He wants to be fair and take in all the information he possibly can before casting his ballot.
And if Dworsky says something nice about one candidate, he makes sure to praise the other one, too.
"Hearing John McCain's record, I think he's got the fortitude, he's got the experience that the other candidate doesn't and Obama is just a wonderful orator and he gets better with every debate."
Dell Erickson also finds things he likes about both candidates, and he's certainly going to vote this year.
"The question is will I vote for a president."
Erickson worries McCain has become too conservative for him, but worries Obama is too inexperienced.
Erickson is looking for one of the candidates to say something new, something that will grab him and convince him that one is clearly better. But he's found the debates utterly unhelpful in that regard.
"We need to have a different kind of a process for examining the points of view of the candidates, because this is not working."
The first three debates didn't work for Jamie Larson, either, but this time was different.
"I've swung dramatically in this last debate."
Larson was Hillary Clinton supporter, and he's had a really hard time picturing himself voting for Obama. But this debate left him closer than he's ever been.
"Barack didn't appear arrogant, and actually looked presidential. This is the very first time I've ever seen that."
Larson's partner, Mark Ellingson, has been soul searching, too. He had also been seriously considering supporting McCain. But when he heard McCain say in the debate that Roe versus Wade should be overturned, Ellingson knew he couldn't vote for him.
"If it was McCain of 2000, who was much more moderate, I could get behind him. But I just can't get behind him, and the fact that he has Sarah Palin right behind him."
Ellingson said Palin is both unqualified and too conservative. So here's his plan. If Barack Obama has a giant lead in the Minnesota polls on election day, he'll write in Hillary Clinton.
But if the race looks close, he's now comfortable voting for Obama.
Dear reader,
Political debates with family or friends can get heated. But what if there was a way to handle them better?
You can learn how to have civil political conversations with our new e-book!
Download our free e-book, Talking Sense: Have Hard Political Conversations, Better, and learn how to talk without the tension.
