The US has had debit cards for longer than most countries. You might be confusing that with the EMV chip rollout. One reason it took so long was because of how deeply embedded the non-chip technology was.
Cheques were unpopular and the US was overly reliant on credit cards.
US debit card usage in 2010 was at least 15 years behind Canada. We had tap and chip cards before you guys even accepted debit cards. E.g. San Francisco's and Seattle's transit systems didn't even accept them at all until 2017. Vancouver accepted them some 20 years earlier.
Yeah, you're confusing debit cards with EMV chips. The US used magnetic stripe for both debit cards and credit cards. The cards were identical (sometimes the only difference between two from the same bank is that one said Credit), with the magnetic stripe telling the card reader which type it was.