All the tension of the US election’s final stretch filled the air as Bermudian student Amanda Spencer took her place in the audience for the last Presidential debate.High security was also highly visible, according to Ms Spencer, with each auditorium row bookended by Secret Service agents.“It’s hard to decide which one of them won, but I do feel President Obama came out very strong,” Ms Spencer said in the wake of Monday’s clash between US President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Governor Mitt Romney.Students at Florida’s Lynn University, many from overseas, got a rare front row seat for a ritual in US politics when their campus hosted the final 90-minute debate.Both candidates deftly fielded the primarily foreign policy questions, Ms Spencer said.“Romney says what he’s going to do, but he doesn’t explain how or why. Obama was better at explaining his goals.”There were no hecklers, or behind-the-scenes gaffes that might have escaped local viewers of the debates, she said, but the intense media presence in the university’s Lynn Performance Centre made the debate, at times, tough to follow.Security agents prowled the aisles, occasionally speaking into microphones strapped to their arms, she said.“When we picked up our tickets, that was the only time we went through a metal detector,” Ms Spencer said, of the lottery places given out to Lynn students.A senior at Lynn, she’s an Obama supporter like many Bermudians — but Ms Spencer said the university’s environs appeared solidly Republican.In the ‘Red’ versus ‘Blue’ nomenclature of US politics, she said: “My community on campus is blue. It’s a very prestigious area where a lot of people are older because they come here to retire. It seemed like all the people we had coming onto campus for the news rooms were Romney supporters.”Given the chance, Ms Spencer said, she would have wanted to hear more about whether Governor Romney would have pulled US troops out of Iraq.For the most part, the debate was a spectator event, she said. Family members of both candidates came onstage at the close of the debate, offering a rare, up-close look at First Lady Michelle Obama.“We were told to be quiet as mice, that all of America, all the world, was watching, and we were just here to witness,” she said. “I think maybe one person dropped something. That was it.”Students are keen to vote next month, not least because of the reported closeness of the race.“This will be a big election because of the extremes,” Ms Spencer predicted. “It’s important, and people will want to vote on the outcome.”