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The first Republican debate's biggest highlights:
Revisit 7 key moments
CBS News | Melissa Quinn, Caitlin Yilek & Kathryn Watson
August 24, 2023
Eight Republican presidential candidates squared off at the first Republican debate of the presidential primary cycle Wednesday night in Milwaukee, where they made the case for their candidacies before their largest audience to date.
The candidates sparred over a variety of issues ranging from abortion and the economy to Ukraine and education. But the most contentious exchanges came when the discussion turned to former President Donald Trump, who skipped the debate and was the "elephant not in the room," as Fox News anchor and moderator Bret Baier put it.
The eight Republicans were asked whether they would support Trump as the party's nominee even if he was convicted of a crime. All but two said they would. Read more
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Out of this world: Chris Christie shocked by lone question about UFOs at Republican debate
USA Today| Anthony Robledo
August 24, 2023
Former New Jersey governor Chris Christie appeared thrown off by being the only candidate to be asked about UFOs at Wednesday night's Republican presidential primary debate.
Moderator Martha MacCallum asked Christie what he would do as president to level with Americans on what the government knows about encounters with extraterrestrials. The FOX news anchor added that more people are taking the concept of unidentified flying objects seriously following last month's congressional hearing.
“I get the UFO question?” Christie said, surprised.
Christie then jokingly insinuated MacCallum asked him the question because they are both from New Jersey. Read more
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GOP-led House committee launches probe into Trump Georgia election case
CNBC | Dan Mangan
August 24, 2023
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The Republican-led House Judiciary Committee opened an investigation into the work of the Atlanta prosecutor who has criminally charged Donald Trump and others with interfering in the 2020 presidential election in Georgia.
The House committee on Thursday sent Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis a letter asking for documents and information, including any communications her office had with Jack Smith, the federal special counsel prosecuting Trump for charges related to trying to overturn the national results of the 2020 election.
“Your indictment and prosecution implicate substantial federal interests, and the circumstances surrounding your actions raise serious concerns about whether they are politically motivated,” Committee Chairman Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, wrote Willis. Read more
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Wisconsin Republicans ask newly elected liberal justice to not hear redistricting case
Associated Press | Scott Bauer
August 23, 2023
Republicans who control the Wisconsin Legislature asked that the newest Democratic-backed justice on the state Supreme Court recuse herself from lawsuits seeking to overturn GOP-drawn electoral maps, arguing that she has prejudged the cases.
Republicans argue in their motions filed with the Wisconsin Supreme Court on Tuesday and made public Wednesday that Justice Janet Protasiewicz can’t fairly hear the cases because during her campaign for the seat earlier this year she called the Republican-drawn maps “unfair” and “rigged” and said there needs to be “a fresh look at the gerrymandering question.”
“Justice Protasiewicz’s campaign statements reveal that her thumb is very much on the scale in this case,” Republicans argue in their motion with the court. Read more
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House Republicans ask DOJ watchdog for information connected to Hunter Biden probe
The Hill | Rebecca Beitsch
August 22, 2023
House Republicans are asking the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) inspector general to clarify the scope of his review into complaints from two IRS whistleblowers about the handling of the Hunter Biden investigation.
The letter, sent by the heads of the House’s Judiciary, Oversight, and Ways and Means committees, comes after Inspector General Michael Horowitz told the three chairs any review would be done alongside the Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR), a common practice when there is alleged misconduct.
The letter asks Horowitz to “explain whether your office is (1) limited in any way from fully investigating the whistleblowers disclosures” and “if you are limited, how and why your office is limited.”
Horowitz earlier this summer said he “has taken a number of steps to assess the information” provided by IRS investigator Gary Shapley, who alleged that the DOJ slow-walked the investigation into Biden and showed him preferential treatment throughout the process. Read more
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Hispanic Republicans vie to oust
Democrats in diverse districts
Candidates run as GOP works to counter image as party of white voters
Roll Call | Daniela Altimari
August 21, 2023
Maria Montero remembers her Peruvian grandfather, a Democrat and loyal member of the carpenters union, yelling at President Ronald Reagan on television when she was growing up in a predominantly Hispanic part of Allentown, Pa.
Reagan had a different effect on Montero, however, giving her inspiration “that life was full of opportunity.” She became an attorney and the director of the state Commission on Women under a Republican governor, and now she is part of a new class of Hispanic Republicans competing for House seats in 2024.
Members of the group span the ideological spectrum from the far right to the moderate middle, but all hail from racially diverse districts that were won by Democrat Joe Biden in 2020 and are represented by Democrats.
In addition to Montero, the group includes Kevin Lincoln, the mayor of Stockton, Calif., who is Mexican American and Black; John Quiñones, a Puerto Rican-born former legislator in Central Florida’s 9th District; and Mayra Flores, who was born in Mexico and won a special election in South Texas in June 2022, then lost the seat five months later. (Montero and Quiñones will both have to win Republican primaries if they are to face Democratic incumbents in November 2024.) Read more
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WG Discussion Points: The Inflation Rate Has Come Down But Grocery Bills Haven’t
WG Discussion Points | David Winston
August 18, 2023
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As the White House is touting Bidenomics, they have focused on a moderating year-over-year inflation rate as a sign of progress. President Biden remarked in late July that “Republicans may have to find something else to criticize me for, now that inflation is coming down.” The reaction we hear from voters across the country is — if inflation is getting better, why haven’t grocery bills improved? Here’s why. The rate of inflation has come down from its peak last summer, but the cumulative rate of inflation under the Biden administration continues to trend upward. From our latest tracking of the Presidential Inflation Rate, prices have gone up 16.9% since Biden took office. Gas has gone up 53.4%, electricity 25.6%, and food 19.4%. WG Discussion Points, August 18, 2023.pdf |
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