It’s official: TV-news anchors can fact-check presidential candidates during a national debate.

In an era when news outlets have been loath to make themselves the target of invective from partisans, ABC News on Tuesday night opted to allow moderators in a broadcast of a presidential debate to correct the participating candidates — mostly former President Donald Trump — in real time, an element often missing from such events. ABC News moderators David Muir and Linsey Davis often gave in to Trump’s demand for more time to respond to Vice President Kamala Harris’ comments, but they also stopped him short by telling him in no uncertain terms that some of the stuff he was peddling — rants about babies being killed after delivery and immigrants in Ohio eating animals — were pure hogwash.

“There is no state in this country where it is legal to kill a baby after it’s born,” Davis stated, after Trump fabricated a story about Minnesota Governor Tim Walz — Harris’ running mate — permitting the execution of babies born full-term. When Trump made a dubious claim about immigrants in Ohio eating cats and dogs, Muir informed him that ABC News had contacted the city manager of Springfield — the town Trump had alluded to — and found no credible evidence of such behavior.

“The people on television say, ‘My dog was taken and used for food,’” Trump said. “I’m not relying on television for this information,” Muir replied. “I’m getting it from the city manager.”

ABC News declined to comment.

Real-time fact-checking in this context has not been a standard practice during debates. There are valid reasons to avoid it. ABC News’ moderators didn’t verify every factual misstatement, and they primarily focused on Trump, drawing criticism from the right on Wednesday.

CNN made a decision to stay away from such stuff during its June telecast of a debate between Trump and President Joe Biden that was moderated by Jake Tapper and Dana Bash. The general feeling is that such forums are meant to give newsmakers and people of interest time to answer questions in depth, and that the exchanges will allow viewers to make decisions about what they hear. Besides, any number of TV anchors will tell you that they worry about getting mired in an “I’m-right-you’re-wrong” discussion on TV — something they feel tests the loyalties of the audience, who might just decide to watch something else.

“One of the things I’ve picked up over the years, whether it’s Secretary Clinton or Donald Trump or whomever, the tougher the question, the more low-key the delivery. It’s more effective. Because then it’s not about, ‘Oh Candidate X and Reporter Y are having this exchange,’ or ‘Look at the ego on Reporter Y.’ It’s not about that. It’s just about the question and the answer,” Tapper told Variety in 2016, after he had captured some spotlight for questioning then-candidate Trump relentlessly on screen about a racist remark he made about a judge. “It’s not that easy.”

ABC News executives clearly had that in mind. Davis and Muir never raised their voices and never sought to turn their exchanges with Trump into verbal sparring. They simply pointed out that what he had said was wrong — and showed they had evidence to prove it.

Others have been testing these waters. On CNN, 10 p.m. anchor Abby Phillip tries to hold a raucous table to account each evening on “NewsNight,” in which a panel of guests from different backgrounds try to hash out the issues of the day. Phillip will occasionally correct someone who puts out misleading information, quietly telling them what CNN’s reporting has determined. But she doesn’t raise the volume in order to do so. Still, that show is not the equivalent of a national square-off for the presidency.

The presidential debates have in the past been hidebound affairs – and with good reason. Between 1988 and 2020, the non-partisan Commission on Presidential Debates organized the process, lining up moderators on its own. Modern politics, however, seem to have overspilled the traditional container. The candidates and their campaigns would rather play to their constituencies and avoid some of the architecture of traditional debate logistics, which seek to limit some of the outbursts that have become inevitable in a social-media age (and often prove ineffective in doing so).

Republicans and Democrats have been keen to sidestep the organization their own parties established in 1987, after several elections where the debates were organized by the League of Women Voters. In 2020, Trump and Biden abandoned their final CPD debate, opting for separate town hall events. Biden appeared on ABC News, while NBC News countered with sending Savannah Guthrie to moderate Trump .

Now, everything about these debates is up for grabs.

The CPD usually held the events closer to Election Day in November. However, campaigns recognize that voters can cast their ballots earlier through mail-in options, and they want to get ahead of that trend. The CPD debates were independent, with various TV networks serving as distributors, not organizers. The moderator was chosen by the non-partisan organization. In 2024, big media companies have taken the reins, using the debates to promote their own anchors and correspondents, and to ensure their logos and branding are prominent. They are even interrupting the discussions with commercial breaks. After all, if a high-viewership broadcast can’t generate revenue in the current era of streaming video and declining linear audiences, what is the point?

Some Trump supporters felt Muir and Davis concentrated their fact-checks on Trump and not on Harris. During CNN’s post-debate analysis, David Urban, a former Trump advisor, felt the moderators scrutinized Trump more than they did Harris. But Scott Jennings, a conservative commentator on CNN, told him that “It is difficult to complain about the referees when you’re not making your own shots.”

The Disney-backed news outlet has new goals to achieve. This debate marked ABC News’ first significant event under Almin Karamehmedovic , who was appointed president of ABC News less than a month ago. It is also a major production under the supervision of Debra OConnell , who was elevated to lead both ABC stations and its national newsgathering operation in February, and who has spent much of her time recently restructuring ABC News.

Whether ABC News’ approach will be imitated remains to be seen. However, one thing is clear: The rules that have governed presidential debates and other types of news specials have likely changed — permanently.