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5 THINGS TO WATCH IN THE GOP DEBATE
By Lisa Desjardins, @LisaDNews
Correspondent
Milwaukee – the Brew City, the Fresh Coast, home of the Fonz (and the bronze Fonz) and the planned site of the 2024 Republican Convention – is about to host the season opener for the entire 2024 election cycle. On Wednesday, eight Republicans face off in the party’s first presidential debate.
On stage, we expect:
- Doug Burgum, governor of North Dakota
- Chris Christie, former governor of New Jersey
- Ron DeSantis, governor of Florida
- Nikki Haley, former governor of South Carolina and former U.N. ambassador
- Asa Hutchinson, former governor of Arkansas
- Mike Pence, former vice president
- Vivek Ramaswamy, businessman and first-time candidate
- Tim Scott, U.S. senator from South Carolina
You can find our short profiles of some of these rivals on YouTube.
Looming over the debate, but not standing on stage, will be former President Donald Trump. The Florida resident said he will not participate in this or other Republican National Committee debates.
So what to watch?
1. The Trump vs. DeSantis proxy war: DeSantis vs. Ramaswamy
With Trump out of the room, DeSantis will be the polling leader at the debate. (He trails the former president by an astounding 37 points in Five Thirty Eight’s polling average.)
Immediately behind DeSantis, and draining his support, is Ramaswamy. The businessman is an intentional echo of Trump, casting himself as a younger, lower-drama alternative. Result: The two camps have been circling each other like two crows eyeing the same mound of food when the bear is away.
(Handy fact: DeSantis and Ramaswamy are the two youngest candidates on stage — DeSantis is 44 years old and Ramaswamy is 38 — and both are fathers of school-aged kids.)
A strategy memo written by a consulting firm connected with DeSantis mentioned Ramaswamy’s Hindu faith and Indian American heritage as the basis for an argument over his tax policy. Another memo in DeSantis land recommended the governor “take a sledge hammer” to Ramaswamy.
Meanwhile, supporters of Trump and Ramaswamy alike have pounced on recent remarks by DeSantis. In an interview, the Florida governor was critical of what he called a pro-Trump “strand” in the Republican party, saying there would be a problem if Republicans operate as “listless vessels” that are supposed to follow whatever Trump writes on social media. A DeSantis spokesman said the candidate meant elected officials, not voters.
But many in MAGA world have decried the comments as akin to Hillary Clinton’s infamous “basket of deplorables” comment.
The Trump vs. DeSantis battle is the party’s current title fight. At the debate, watch how that translates into a different – but also proxy – battle between DeSantis and Ramaswamy.
2. Tackling or tiptoeing around Trump?
In general, most of the Republican candidates on stage have shown a passionate determination to praise Trump or at least avoid direct criticism of him.
There are exceptions. Former Govs. Hutchinson and Christie have bluntly criticized Trump as dangerous and a mistake for the country. Pence praises his former boss but also regularly cites his break with Trump over the Jan. 6 attack and Trump’s push to overturn the election.
The moderators from FOX News have made it clear they will ask questions about Trump, his actions and beliefs.
Watch to see if the rest of the candidates, in trying to prove loyalty to Trump, gang up on Christie and Hutchinson.
Or, if they avoid that confrontation in the name of not giving more airtime to Trump criticism.
Or, if they all attempt a kind of pivot, saying, “we need someone new.”
3. What is an “elite”?
Republicans, including Trump and DeSantis, have long railed against what they see as the “elites.”
Sometimes that is “ivory tower” elites. Sometimes “Ivy League” elites.
But both DeSantis and Ramaswamy have Ivy League pedigrees as strong as New England cobblestone. DeSantis attended Yale for undergrad and Harvard Law School. Ramaswamy is a mirror image, attending Harvard undergrad and Yale Law School.
This leaves open an attack possibility for the six candidates trying to displace both men in the second-place hunt. But it is not just a debate tactic. It is a central theme behind current Republican messaging.
Watch how much the idea of elitism comes up, who raises it and how.
(And, while we are on the topic of education, watch who, Ivy League or not, came prepared. Who did their homework?)
4. A Nikki Haley (or Tim Scott) (or someone else) moment
Two candidates we will be watching closely, especially after spending time in Iowa, are South Carolinians Haley (former governor) and Scott (current senator).
Haley has put in the hours in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, and her dedicated campaigning has paid off on the stump. She is confident, warm and has something to say. But she is not yet breaking out of the pack and has not faced a debate stage like this.
We are watching Haley in particular because she more than anyone else in the middle tier of the race so far has broken directly with Trump on a few issues, including how they see U.S. support for Ukraine. We are wondering if she will go further on offense in the debate, either with criticism of the others or by stressing where she differs.
Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., offers the inverse dynamic. He has gone out of his way not to criticize other candidates, but to stay relentlessly on message about his beliefs and optimism. Watch to see if he lays out more specifics about his ideology, and if his “happy warrior” approach steals the show amid a cacophony of candidates interrupting one another.
5. Is this for 2024 or 2028?
Lastly, is this even about 2024 anymore? Or is this a kind of “I put my bag down there” way of holding a place in line for 2028?
The Constitution limits presidents to being elected twice.
Thus, whether Trump wins or loses, it seems likely that Republicans will need another nominee in just four short years.
Candidates on stage could be thinking about that longer horizon.
This is where the language around Trump could be telling. If candidates are particularly ambiguous, warmly ambiguous, about Trump, it could be a sign that they are at least keeping options open for the next big shot for the White House.
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