Tonight at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin the first Republican Presidential Primary debate will be held. Former President Donald Trump has said he will not appear but instead clips of him will be shown for the candidates to respond to. This year the Republican National Committee (RNC) has set the following conditions for candidates to qualify for the first debate, namely that they have 40,000 individual donors, and they must have 200 individual donors from at least 20 states. Also the candidates must poll 1% in multiple polls.
Despise some drama of a basketball injury last night North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum will be at the debate. Chris Christie was once a staunch supporter of Donald Trump’s but has emerged along with Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson as the two Anti-Trump candidates at tonight’s debates. Nikki Haley, Mike Pence, Ron DeSantis, Vivek Ramasway, and Tim Scott have all been running to various degrees as somewhat Trump like. In full disclosure we must reveal that our sympathies at tonight’s debate are with Governor’s Christie and Hutchinson, we will strive to show fairness in our appraisal of the other candidates.
This will be the first time in almost three years we have watched Fox News. But seeing as the network is the broadcaster for this debate, we have to go into the lions den to watch it. We figured we would watch and report on the debate so you don’t have to! Of course we as always would love to hear any feedback you have regarding tonight’s debate. We just pray it doesn’t devolve into a freak show!
Martha Macallum and Bret Baier moderated the debate. Ground rules for the debate are the moderators asked the questions, candidates have one minute to respond, if someone is singled out they have 30 seconds to respond.
DeSantis spoke first and proceeded to attack the congress for overspending, attacked the Biden administration. Argued for the need to reduce taxes and spending.
Christie said he disagreed with DeSantis by saying that in order to be successful in reducing inflation, taxes and deficit spending that Republicans need to sell their plans and win over a majority of the public.
Tim Scott alternated between promoting some ideas of his own and attacking the Biden administration.
Vivek Ramaswany argued that his experience as a family man and entrepreneur give him the outsider perspective needed to help guide the country to better economic times. So far his conspiracy theories haven’t come up.
Nikki Haley opened by attacking Republicans for passing large spending bills including many of the other candidates on the stage while also attacking Donald Trump for raising the national debt. So far Haley is the only one to criticize Trump.
Mike Pence opens by praising the Trump-Pence administration, Pence criticized Ramaswamy for saying the President can’t do everything. Vivek and Pence started to have an exchange saying that Vivek lacks the experience to be President. DeSantis then fired back attacking the Trump administration for COVID lockdowns. Ramaswamy seems intent on pushing the line that he is an outsider.
Governor Doug Burgum opened with a joke about his recent leg injury, and criticized the Biden administration regarding energy policy.
Asa Hutchinson talked about his record as a tax cutting and budget balancing Governor. He argues that he has experience as the head of the DEA, as a Governor and a Prosecutor give him the needed skills to be President.
So far DeSantis is doing better than we expected, Ramaswamy seems to be doing most of the talking. Pence has been more aggressive than we expected but doesn’t seem to be scoring many points. Nikki Haley is appearing more thoughtful, independent and articulate than many would have thought she would be. Chris Christie has been willing to go after Vivek for being to inexperienced. Tim Scott pointed out that the United States has drastically reduced its carbon footprint and points out as Nikki Hailey has that China by far produces more carbon output than America and that is where we need to crackdown on carbon emissions.
Impressions so far of the debate is Nikki Hailey and Ron DeSantis have helped to revive their campaigns so far. Mike Pence is not making up any ground. Hutchinson has done okay but is not standing out enough. Christie is getting plenty of attention, remains to be seen if it helps him. Burgum is alright but isn’t making enough waves.
The moderator’s next turned to the subject of abortion and how the issue has affected the Republican Party. Nikki Hailey says she favors late term abortions, favors the availability of contraception and not demonizing women who get abortions. She was met with great applause. DeSantis defended his record on abortion and tap danced around whether he would support a six week abortion ban nationally. Pence talked about his faith and said that he supports a fifteen week abortion ban. Hailey responded to Pence by saying that Pence needs to be honest about the difficulties in passing a nationwide abortion ban. Burgum stated he doesn’t favor a federal abortion ban because that is a state issue. Burgum was meet with great applause. Asa Hutchinson argue that infant care and adoption should be part of the dialogue regarding abortion.
Chris Christie when asked about gun violence. He stated that the laws need to be enforced and violent criminals should be held accountable for their actions.
Now that we are about 52 minutes in we are finally going to be asked about Donald Trumps indictments! Love how Brett Baier referred to Donald Trump as the “Elephant not in the room”.
The candidates are asked to raise there hands if they would support Trump if he is convicted of crimes. Only Asa Hutchinson and Chris Christie refused to raise their hands. Chris Christie says that we cannot normalize a presidential candidate being convicted of crimes. Christie and Ramaswamy had a heated exchange over the issue. With Vivek defending Trump and Christie pushing back against Vivek as a foolish amateur. Tim Scott said that Mike Pence acted properly on January 6th, DeSantis refused to answer the question. Pence defended his actions on 1/6. Hutchinson said that Trump is morally disqualified from being president and that under the 14th Amendment Trump might be disqualified from being President. Christie emphatically defended Pence and pointed out that Republicans can’t move forward until Donald Trump is dealt with.
After all the shouting over Donald Trump the debate moved onto the issue of Ukraine funding. Ramaswamy proceeded to rattle off his usual Pro Putin talking points and criticized Christie for going to Ukraine. Christie responded by discussing the war crimes of Russia towards the Ukrainians and said that if we refuse to stand up to Putin we will invite more tyrants by refusing to fight against dictators. Pence and Ramaswamy engaged in a bitter back and forth over the war in Ukraine. Ramaswamy was met with more boos than we expected from his alt right talking points. Nikki Hailey made the moral case for supporting Ukraine and stated that if our goal is to reduce China’s influence than we should help Ukraine defeat Russia. We are pleased that the reaction of the audience so far is one of support for Ukraine.
With only about a half hour to go in the debate here’s our thoughts: Nikki Hailey, Mike Pence and DeSantis are all doing much better than many thought they would at this point. The rumors of Hailey’s political death might have been greatly exaggerated! Mike Pence was aggressive but we seriously still doubt he will win the nomination. Ron DeSantis didn’t embarrass himself too much we still don’t think he’ll get the nomination. But his performance so far will keep his campaign alive.
Asa Hutchinson and Doug Burgum might drop out before Iowa. They just aren’t getting the traction they need tonight to further there campaign. Chris Christie probably is still a long shot for the nomination but he is doing a great job attacking Vivek Ramaswamy and Donald Trump. Before tonight we thought everyone would have knives out on DeSantis, instead it’s turning into a attack against Vivek! Probably because Vivek comes off as such an asshole they candidates probably just decided to attack him en masse. Donald Trump is also a loser by refusing to attend the debate he’s helped breathe new life into some of his opponents. Wouldn’t surprise us if Donald Trump eventually enters some of the future Primary debates. No doubt the fact that it took almost an hour before he was mentioned in any noticeable way. Will have to keep an eye on the polls over the next couple days and weeks to see who gains and if Trump losses any ground.
The candidates gave their speeches about why they feel they can help inspire the American people. Interestingly all of the candidates even Vivek Ramaswamy struck optimistic tones about America and it’s future. This is a stark contrast to the apocalyptic doom and gloom ramblings of Donald Trump. This debate although tiring was not as depressing as we feared it would be.
