Thursday’s Republican presidential debate in North Charleston, S.C., featuring the seven top-polling candidates, was preceded by an “undercard” debate, with three low-polling candidates.
Cruz and Rubio have sparred for months over immigration. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)
THE CONTENDERS | Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) have sparred for months over the issue of immigration, with Cruz hitting Rubio for co-sponsoring a Senate bill that would have given a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. Rubio has pushed right back, pointing to an amendment Cruz made to that bill that would have allowed undocumented immigrants to have legal status.
Let’s break down what Cruz believes on immigration:
Rubio said Cruz supported increases in green cards and high-tech visas known as H1B. True?
Yes. In 2013 Cruz supported doubling the caps on green cards and increasing the number of H1-B visas – fivefold.
In an immigration plan released in November on Rubio’s home turf in Orlando, Cruz called for curbs on legal immigration by halting any increases in the number of people coming to the United States legally until the economy improves and temporarily stopping the issuance of visas for high-tech workers because of reported abuses in the program.
What does Cruz want to do with the 11 million undocumented citizens currently in the United States?
Cruz, for years, had refused to say what he would do with undocumented immigrants — a plan to address the issue was conspicuously absent from Cruz’s immigration proposals — drawing criticism from some conservatives. In the last debate he finally provided his answer, stating that he opposes granting legal status. Cruz has said that the amendment that still allowed people to get work permits under Rubio’s immigration bill was intended as a poison pill to completely kill the legislation.
The Texas senator is against a pathway to citizenship, which he calls “amnesty.” He is calling for a crackdown on illegal immigration, proposing an increase in deportations. He wants to triple the number of Border Patrol agents, build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border and increase surveillance there. Cruz also wants to end birthright citizenship, the process by which any baby born in the United States is granted citizenship, regardless of the legal status of his or her parents.
Republican presidential candidates (L-R) Ohio Governor John Kasich, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), Donald Trump, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), Ben Carson and Jeb Bush. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)
* Marco Rubio: The Florida Senator has clearly been taking notes from Donald Trump. Rubio came out hot from the start — channeling the anger of the Republican base much more effectively than he has in past debates. He also kept his message laser-focused on bashing President Obama and Hillary — an approach that allowed him to look magnanimous and big.
Rubio also re-proved his ability to drop the opposition research book on an opponent, unloading on Ted Cruz as a flip flopper in the final moments of the debate. “That is not consistent conservatism,” Rubio said of Cruz’s voting record. “That is political calculation.”
Rubio also benefited from the fact that, despite all of the pre-debate predictions that he would be at the center of attacks from other establishment figures, he barely had a glove laid on him. Even Chris Christie, who’s never seen a showdown he didn’t want to be part of, side-stepped a chance to unload on Rubio’s lack of experience in elected office.
* Donald Trump: Yes, Cruz got the better of him on the citizenship back and forth — although the fact that a question about the Texas Senator’s eligibility to be president was the third one asked in the entire debate amounted to a win for Trump. And, yes, Trump’s answer on a tariff against China was, well, hard to understand (to be kind.)
But, unlike in the precious five debates, Trump seemed engaged throughout. He interjected — like in the conversation about corporate inversions — where it made sense for him to. His response to Cruz’s attack on “New York values” was an effective piece of political rhetoric. His insistence that he is “very angry” because of the mismanagement of the country worked well too.
Trump’s performances in these debates are never home runs — he’s too undisciplined and unprepared for that. But, this was, without question his best debate.
* Ted Cruz: Like Rubio, the Texas Senator is just good at this. He owned Trump on a back and forth over questions about his citizenship — and did it with a smile on his face. As he has done in each of the previous debates, Cruz showed an appealing policy (and political) profile for conservatives still looking for a candidate.Cruz was knocked back somewhat by Trump over the “New York values” attack — hard to look like you are on the wrong side of those who helped rebuild New York City after 9/11 — and got beaten at his own game by Rubio when it came to voting records. It wasn’t Cruz’s strongest debate but his “average” performance is still pretty high.
* 7-person debates: Sure, Rand Paul and Carly Fiorina didn’t like it but the truth is that limiting the number of people on the debate stage makes for a much more watchable experience. More debates, less people in them!
* Commercials: Four commercials! Ok! My bladder thanks you Fox Business!
Losers
* Ben Carson: I mean…words fail. The neurosurgeon has often looked out of his depth in these debates but never more so than tonight. He spoke, well, almost never. And, when he did manage to get the floor, he talked about the threat from an electromagnetic pulse. Um, ok. Carson’s trend line in this race has been steadily downward for the last month. Nothing he did tonight will change that.
* Neil Cavuto/Maria Bartiromo: Look, moderating debates — especially at this level with this number of candidates — is hard. But, the key to making these debates work as they should is to force the candidates to get off their talking points — usually by asking pointed follow-up questions or allowing the candidates to go at one another. There was way too little of either in this debate, meaning that we didn’t learn as much about who the candidates really are (and what they really think) as we might have.
* Two-hour debates: A debate that starts at 9 p.m. on the east coast is tough enough. One that ends at 11:30 pm is beyond the pale. Can’t we limit these things to a hard two hours? Name one person who would oppose that.
* Fashion risks: 7 dudes. 7 dark suits. 6 white shirts. 4 red ties. 3 blue ties. I mean, can’t we shake it up even a little bit? How about a grey suit? A purple tie? Some stripes? (Shouts to Neil Cavuto’s wide pinstripe suit; not my style but I applaud zigging while everyone else zags.)
THE CONTENDERS | Wonkblog’s Emily Badger breaks down how the framers of the Constitution ranked — or didn’t — the Bill of Rights:
Among all of the arguments that have been made this election about the special power of the Second Amendment, Chris Christie floated a particularly interesting one in Thursday night’s GOP debate: The framers of the Constitution clearly thought it was a really important right because they ranked it second.
“See, here’s the thing,” he said. “I don’t think the founders put the Second Amendment as number two by accident. I don’t think they dropped all the amendments into a hat and picked them out of a hat. I think they made the Second Amendment the second amendment because they thought it was just that important.”
In fact, the rights in the Bill of Rights were never ranked by importance. The First and Second Amendments even looked entirely different in their original form in 1789 — the first was about how to apportion Congressional seats, the second about whether members of Congress could raise their own salaries. Heady stuff! Neither was ratified at the time (the original second amendment later became the 27th).
That means the amendments we now know as One through Ten were originally Three through Twelve.
For his part, James Madison wanted all these rights to be tucked into the main body of the Constitution. He lost that battle. But, as Slate wrote a few years ago, “The order of that list, however, still reflects Madison’s view: They come in the same order as the sections of the Constitution that they would have modified.”
If you do happen to subscribe to Christie’s interpretation, though, because it boosts the perceived importance of gun rights, then it inevitably follows that another right is even more important than that one: Freedom of the press.
Rubio v Cruz: it’s on. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)
THE CONTENDERS | It took about two hours, but the rhetorical war between Sens. Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz just spilled onto the stage with more mutual animosity than ever before.
Rubio went after Cruz on a host of issues — immigration, taxes, defense spending — and cast him as a flip-flopper. Cruz said Rubio was mischaracterizing his views and slammed him as too soft on immigration. (Even Donald Trump chimed in to pour fuel on the fire, asking if it looked like the two liked each other.)
Here’s why this matters: The Trump-Cruz rivalry and the Rubio-Christie rivalry has gotten a lot of attention tonight. But Cruz and Rubio are running had against each other, too. Rubio, more than any other candidate that has support in the establishment wing of the party, is also trying to win over conservative activists. That’s Cruz’s strong suit.
With the Iowa caucuses less than three weeks away, this battle’s far from over.
Republican presidential candidates Texas Senator Ted Cruz (R) and businessman Donald Trump. AFP PHOTO/ TIMOTHY A. CLARY
THE CONTENDERS | One of the best exchanges of the sixth Republican presidential debate came thanks to The Washington Post. When our Robert Costa and Philip Rucker asked Donald Trump about Ted Cruz’s having been born in Canada, Trump replied that it could be a problem — kicking off more than a week of debate over whether or not Cruz was a “natural-born citizen” eligible to be president under the constitution.
The topic came up during the debate after Cruz was asked to respond to the issue. The Texas senator wasted no time in engaging Trump on the topic — even suggesting that Trump‘s citizenship might be questionable.
CRUZ: At the end of the day, the legal issue is quite straightforward. But i would note that the birther theories that Donald has been relying on, some of the more extreme ones insist that you must not only be born on U.S. soil, but have two parents born on U.S. soil. Under that theory, not only would I be disqualified, Marco Rubio would be disqualified, Bobby Jindal would be disqualified and, interestingly enough, Donald J. Trump would be disqualified.
TRUMP: Not me!
CRUZ: Because — because Donald’s mother was born in Scotland. She was naturalized.
TRUMP: But I was born here. Big difference.
CRUZ: On the issue of citizenship, Donald, I’m not going to use the issue of your mother’s birth against you.
TRUMP: Because it wouldn’t work.
Trump’s right. Cruz’s theory — certainly proposed for rhetorical purposes and not sincere ones — is not one that’s actually embraced by legitimate scholars. (And to Cruz’s credit, he did label the theory “one of the more extreme ones.”)
As we have noted before, the United States legal code doesn’t articulate what counts as “natural-born” in the constitutional sense, but it does outline very clearly who counts as a citizen at birth. Nowhere is it dictated that the parents have been born in the country.
Where’d it come from? It seems to have originated with Orly Taitz. Taitz is a well-known conspiracy theorist who was at the center of the fight over Barack Obama’s citizenship — arguably even more deeply than Trump.
“We have the lowest percentage of Americans working today of any year since 1977.”
–Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.)
THE FACT CHECKER | The labor participation rate fell to 62.4 percent in September, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the lowest since 1977, when it touched 62.3 percent. (The rate inched up to 62.6 percent in December.)
When Obama took office in January, 2009, the workforce participation rate was 65.7 percent. So there has certainly been a decline. But the rate had already been on a steady downward track since it hit a high of 67.3 percent in the last year of Bill Clinton’s presidency.
A key reason? The composition of the labor force has been affected by the retirement of the leading edge of the Baby Boom generation.
The Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago in 2012 concluded that just over half of the post-1999 decline in the participation rate comes from the retirement of the baby boomers. Critically, the research showed that the problem is only going to get worse in the rest of the decade, with retirements accounting for two-thirds of the decline of participation rate by 2020. In other words, the rate will keep declining, no matter how well the economy does.
Republican U.S. presidential candidate Senator Marco Rubio (L) steps into a conversation between candidate and businessman Donald Trump (C) and rival and former Governor Jeb Bush (R) during a break in the Fox Business Network Republican presidential candidates debate in North Charleston, South Carolina, January 14, 2016. REUTERS/Randall Hill
THE CONTENDERS | This time it didn’t get as personal.
Republican presidential candidates Jeb Bush and Donald Trump had a tamer exchange tonight on whether or not to temporarily ban all Muslims from entering the United States.
After Trump said he stood by his call for a temporary ban, Bush interjected: “All Muslims? Seriously?”
“Sending that signal makes it impossible for us to be serious … I hope you’ll reconsider,” he added.
“The better way of dealing with this is recognizing that there are Islamic terrorists embedded in refugee populations… You have cannot make rash statements and expect the rest of the world respond as well, oh, it’s just politics,” he said.
But Trump stood his ground.
“I want security for this country. I’m tired of seeing what’s going on,” he said.
Moderator Neil Cavuto jumped in, reminding Bush that he called Trump’s idea “unhinged” and that the front-runner’s poll numbers jumped 8 percent after he announced his idea.
“Eleven percent,” Trump said.
Bush said he didn’t believe those supporting Trump’s idea were unhinged because he understood their anger and fear. He quickly suggested implementing some of the changes proposed by Congress, including changes to the visa entry program.
The debate crowd seemed to favor Bush — and Trump aides have raised questions tonight about whether the room was stacked against their guy.
But Trump seemed to get the upper hand as the exchange ended, reiterating his main point: “All I want is security.”
Right now, that answer is more likely to appeal to a broader collection of Republican voters.
BY THE NUMBERS | Republican hopefuls chided Democrats for political correctness in not acknowledging America is at war with “radical Islam,” terminology which President Obama and Hillary Clinton have avoided. But polling shows Americans don’t have such qualms about the rhetoric.
In November, 59 percent of the public in a Washington Post-ABC News poll said the U.S. is at war with radical Islam, while 37 percent said it is not. Even among Democrats, over half (53 percent) thought the U.S. is at war with radical Islam.
While endorsing Republicans’ favored terminology, Americans’ concerns about Islam do not appear to have changed much in the wake of the Islamic State’s rise and shootings in San Bernardino, Calif. by a couple who pledged allegiance to the group. In December, a Post-ABC poll found 54 percent saying Islam is mainly a peaceful religion while 28 percent said it encourages violence and 17 percent had no opinion, little different from opinions in 2010.
“The FBI director told the American people, told Congress, that he could not guarantee that he could vet them [Syrian refugees] and it would be safe.”
–Christie
THE FACT CHECKER | Christie overstated what FBI director James Comey said in congressional testimony.
Comey made his remarks in response to a bill that would have required Comey to personally certify that every single refugee admitted into the country was not a security threat. “Could I certify to there being no risk associated with an individual?” Comey said on Dec. 9. “The bureau doesn’t take positions on legislation, and we don’t get involved in policy decisions. But that practically would be impossible.”
Comey has made it clear that the process in place to vet refugees has gotten better, but there is nothing that is “risk-free.”
Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush. (AP Photo/Rainier Ehrhardt)
BY THE NUMBERS | Jeb Bush called for a bipartisan focus on mental health issues in dealing with gun violence after criticizing President Obama’s executive actions on federal gun regulations. Polls show most Americans agree with both Bush and Obama to some extent.
Sixty-three percent of Americans in an October Washington Post-ABC News poll said mass shootings in the country are more a reflection of problems identifying and treating people with mental health issues than they are a reflection of inadequate gun laws. A 2013 Post-ABC poll found that 85 percent said inadequate mental health treatment contributes to gun violence in the U.S.
But polls in the wake of Obama’s actions expanding background checks and FBI resources have also received positive reviews from most Americans, with 62 percent supporting them in a CBS News/New York Times poll and 67 percent in a CNN/ORC poll. That support was notably lower than the 88 percent of the public who supported requiring background checks on all gun buyers in the CBS/NYT poll, similar to most recent polls.
A majority of Republicans, 51 percent, in the CNN/ORC poll backed Obama’s proposal, as did 43 percent in the CBS/NYT survey.
Despite support for the broad policy, far fewer said Obama’s executive actions were within his authority – 49 percent said so in the CBS/NYT poll, while 44 percent favored Obama using executive orders to implement the policies.
SOCIAL STUDIES | Our analytics partners at Zignal Labs created this graphic to show which emojis appeared in conjunction most often with each of the candidates on stage during the first hour.
SOCIAL STUDIES | Not to pile on, but it is worth noting: since the beginning of the debate, ten states have tweeted more about Rand Paul than Ben Carson — and Paul isn’t even on the stage…
They are the blue states in this map from our analytics partners at Zignal Labs. Note that Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada — three of the first four states to hold primary elections — are among the states where the Kentucky senator got the most buzz.
The Iran crisis is over. Except on stage. AFP PHOTO/ TIMOTHY A. CLARYTIMOTHY A. CLARY/AFP/Getty Images
NORTH CHARLESTON, S.C. — In the “undercard” debate and the beginning of tonight’s prime time debate, the Republican candidates for president raged against an international incident that had made the front pages but faded by evening broadcasts. Iran briefly detained ten sailors whose ship — according to Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter — slipped into that country’s waters. They were let go, but not before a photo was taken of the sailors with their hands up.
“Today, many of us picked up our newspapers, and we were horrified to see the sight of 10 American sailors on their knees, with their hands on their heads,” said Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) “In that State of the Union, President Obama didn’t so much as mention the 10 sailors that had been captured by Iran.”
The issue, which hung in the air at both debates, never found a resolution onstage. The crisis had started and ended within one news cycle, making it 443 shorter than the Iranian hostage crisis. How would the Republicans who saw it as a case of Iran rolling over a feckless Barack Obama have handled the sailor dust-up?
“I would have made it very, very clear to the Iranians that they need to release these people immediately,” said former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum after the debate. “If they are doing anything in any way that violates their rights under the Geneva Convention, there will be a price to pay. [The Obama administration] has not done so. They low-keyed it. They said there was no apology. They said they were treated courteously, or whatever they said. That was not true. And what was the reaction? We’re gonna give ’em money. We’re gonna follow through with our plan to allow a path to energy.”
Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee used the question to imagine an alternate history. “First of all, we would have never had the Iranian deal,” he said. “If they had taken sailors, we would have demanded their immediate release. We would also have demanded the release of the Washington Post reporter, and Pastor Abedini. The fact that they’re sitting in a Tehran jail is absolutely embarrassing to the United States of America.”
At the main stage, Cruz answered the question by imagining an undefined, tough response. “If I am elected president,” he said, “no service man or service woman will be forced to be on their knees, and any nation that captures our fighting men will feel the full force and fury of the United States of America” — a designation loose enough to include Mexico.
SOCIAL STUDIES | Ted Cruz narrowly received the most mentions in all media over the first 75 minutes of the GOP face-off — 26 percent compared to 24 percent for Donald Trump, according to our analytics partners at Zignal Labs:
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump. (AP Photo/Chuck Burton)
“When I looked at the migration, I looked at the line … where are the women? They look like — very few women, very few children — strong, powerful men. Young. And people are looking at that, and they’re saying, ‘What’s going on?’”
–businessman Donald Trump
THE FACT CHECKER | In answering a question about refugees from Syria, Trump incorrectly cited refugee demographics data.
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) data show men and women are split evenly among 4.6 million registered Syrian refugees. These numbers reflect Syrian refugees registered by UNHCR in a number of countries, including Egypt, Iraq, Jordan and Lebanon. According to the data as of Dec. 31, 6.5 percent are “young men” of 12 to 17 years old. Another 22.2 percent of the refugees are men over 18 years old. The rest are women, girls and boys. So clearly, this data set does not support Trump’s description of refugees as mostly young men.
There is another dataset, the “sea arrivals,” that supports his claim. This is the UNHCR count of refugees and migrants who cross the Mediterranean Sea to reach Europe. There were just over 1 million arrivals by sea in 2015, and 49 percent of them were men. Women comprised 19 percent and children comprised 31 percent. But Syrians comprise 48 percent of the total sea arrivals.
“If you look at my record as governor of New Jersey, I have vetoed a .50-caliber rifle ban. I have vetoed a reduction in clip size. I have vetoed a statewide-ID system for gun owners, and I have pardoned six out-of-state folks who came through our state and were arrested for owning a gun legally in another state, so they never had to face charges.”
–Christie
THE FACT CHECKER | Christie has a mixed control on gun control. While he highlights the pro-gun actions he took, Christie also signed into law 10 other measures that tightened gun restrictions in New Jersey. The state is considered to have some of the toughest gun restrictions in the nation.
Christie endorsed gun reform bills when he became governor in 2009. He called for a ban on the .50-caliber rifle. Then, in 2013, Christie vetoed the .50-caliber rifle ban sent by the legislature, saying he had wanted a narrower ban.
In fact, in 2013, Christie touted his support for banning the .50 caliber rifle and requiring photo identification for firearms purchasers as measures “responsibly expanding New Jersey’s already stringent gun control measures.” The news release is still on the Governor’s Office website.
Christie has become more pro-gun since he took office in 2009 as governor. Recently, The Fact Checker found that Christie flip-flopped in his description of how his experience as United States attorney in New Jersey for seven years shaped his views on gun laws. In 2009, he said his law enforcement experience made him more pro-gun control. Now, he says the experience helped shape his pro-gun views.
Republican presidential candidate New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie. (AP Photo/Chuck Burton)
THE CONTENDERS | New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie claimed tonight that he didn’t support the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court.
As The Washington Post Fact Checker’s Michelle Ye Hee Lee wrote this week, Christie “initially opposed Obama’s nomination of Sotomayor, but ultimately expressed support in 2009.” She added later that “Christie clearly has a problem with consistency. Instead of ‘telling it like it is,’ Christie tells it like it might have been.”
Instead of friendly, we saw fire. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)
THE CONTENDERS | The odd political bromance between Donald Trump and Ted Cruz is officially over.
Cruz’s new pattern of Trump pushback continued when the two men hit the stage tonight
For the past week, Trump has been hitting Cruz on the fact that he is born in Canada, questioning his eligibility to be president. Last fall, Trump said that Cruz’s birthplace wasn’t an issue.
“The Constitution hasn’t changed, but poll numbers have,” Cruz said. “I recognize that Donald is dismayed that is poll numbers are falling in Iowa.”
Why is Trump hitting Cruz on his Canadian birth now?
“Now he’s doing a little bit better. I didn’t care before. It’s true,” he said.
Cruz had long held his fire against Trump – the Texas senator and his campaign said there was a benefit to having the mogul in the race stoking ire against Washington. Cruz also drifted close to the front-runner in the hopes of inheriting Trump’s supporters, should his campaign collapse.
But this week Cruz changed tactics. He questioned Trump’s competence to be president, tied him to Hillary Clinton and questioned his “New York values.” In the debate, Cruz said that Trump once would have been disqualified from being president because his mother was born in Scotland.
Trump repeated the advice to Cruz he’s been dispensing publicly for days: go to court and get the citizenship question straightened out.
“I’m not going to be taking legal advice from Donald Trump,” Cruz, a lawyer, said.
Meanwhile, a Houston attorney filed a lawsuit against Cruz claiming he should be disqualified from running for president because of his birthplace, Bloomberg News reported.
He did support President Obama’s nomination of Sotomayor to the United States Supreme Court, although begrudgingly.
Christie first opposed her nomination, saying in a radio interview during the 2009 gubernatorial primary she was “not my kind of judge.” Then, in July 2009, Christie released a statement expressing support, even though she “would not have been my first choice.”
His statement supporting Sotomayor read: “After watching and listening to Judge Sotomayor’s performance at the confirmation hearings this week, I am confident that she is qualified for the position of Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. Elections have consequences. One of those consequences are judicial appointments. While Judge Sotomayor would not have been my choice, President Obama has used his opportunity to fill a seat on the Supreme Court by choosing a nominee who has more than proven her capability, competence and ability.”
On Planned Parenthood, it’s not clear exactly what happened. Christie said in 1994 that he supported “Planned Parenthood privately with my personal contribution and that should be the goal of any such agency, to find private donations.” (Christie was pro-choice in 1994, but then became pro-life.)
Now he says he never made the donation, and his campaign said there is no record of one. Of course, given that Planned Parenthood is a non-profit and doesn’t disclose private donations, there wouldn’t be a record. Planned Parenthood couldn’t confirm a donation either, because of its policy not to disclose donors’ information.
Christie now says he was misquoted in that 1994 article, which was even quoted in a 2012 biography of Christie by Bob Ingle and Michael Symons. Why it took 22 years to point out this error publicly, we’re not sure.
THE CONTENDERS | The fight between Sen. Marco Rubio and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie that has been playing out on the campaign trail just happened before a live national audience.
Both men said they liked the other — before ripping their rival, of course.
“We cannot afford to have a president of the United States who supports Common Core,” said Rubio.
Christie accused Rubio of being hypocritical in attacking him, since Rubio took issue with Jeb Bush going after him during a previous debate, saying he was only doing so because someone told him it would help him win.
“It appears that the same someone has been whispering in Ol’ Marco’s ear too,” quipped Christie.
The exchange affirmed the way the two have started hitting each other. Christie prefers personal digs. Rubio is partial to policy criticism.
For more on why the Christie-Rubio rivalry matters — they are both fighting for position in New Hampshire and more broadly for the establishment lane — check out our story from today.
Republican presidential candidate and former Governor Jeb Bush. REUTERS/Chris Keane
THE CONTENDERS | In his first debate answer, Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush name-dropped James E. Livingston, a retired Marine major general.
A Medal of Honor recipient, Livingston earned the military’s highest honor for service during the Vietnam War. He’s also an active campaign surrogate for Bush. He stars in a tough television ad that has aired in New Hampshire.
“This is no reality show. This is serious business. This is about the livelihood of our kids and grandkids. This commander in chief requires training wheels,” Livingston says in the ad as video shows a photo of President Obama.
South Carolina has tens of thousands of active-duty and retired military service members living in the state, so campaigning with decorated retired military officers is likely to draw attention among GOP primary voters there.
But Bush has also campaigned with prominent veterans in Iowa, where he campaigned this week with Robert J. Natter, a retired Navy admiral who once commanded the U.S. Atlantic Fleet. And retired Air Force Col. Leo Thorsness, another Medal of Honor recipient, has campaigned with Bush in Iowa and New Hampshire.
Republican presidential candidate, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., speaks as Republican presidential candidate, businessman Donald Trump looks on. (AP Photo/Rainier Ehrhardt)
“Someone who lies to the families of those four victims of Benghazi can never be the president of the United States.”
–Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.)
THE FACT CHECKER | Rubio once again claimed that former secretary of state Hillary Clinton “lied” to the families of the victims of the Benghazi attacks and asserted that the attack took place because of a YouTube video.
As we have noted, the evidence for this claim is murky and open to interpretation. But Rubio really goes too far in suggesting that she told this to all of the families of the four who were killed in the terrorist attacks. Here’s the rundown of what we know:
U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens
His father says Clinton did not mention a video.
State Department Information Specialist Sean Smith
His mother says every administration official, including Clinton, cited the video.
Former Navy Seal Tyrone Woods
His father says Clinton cited the video as the cause
His mother says Clinton did not mention the video
Former Navy Seal Glen Doherty
His mother says Clinton did not mention a video
His sister says she did not mention a video but referenced a “spontaneous protest”
At the very least, Rubio cannot so sweepingly declare that she made such statements to “the families of those four victims.” Some of those family members say they did not hear that.
THE CONTENDERS | Sen. Marco Rubio opened with an aggressive criticism of President Obama and Hillary Clinton — much like the other candidates on stage.
“Hillary Clinton is disqualified from being commander-in-chief,” a line he often uses on the campaign trail.
For Rubio, it’s a continuation of the style he has adopted more and more on the trail lately:
His criticism of Obama and Clinton is more piercing. The elbows he is throwing at his GOP opponents are sharper. And his warnings about the national security risks of siding with them over him are more dire and more frequent.
Republican U.S. presidential candidate Senator Ted Cruz gestures towards rival candidate businessman Donald Trump. REUTERS/Chris Keane
ON THE ISSUES | The latest candidate to have to answer for a past discrepancy is Cruz — one of the leaders in Iowa. The New York Times looked at his personal financial disclosures from 2012, when he was running for the Senate bid that launched his national career, and reported Thursday that he received about $1 million in loans from Goldman Sachs, his wife’s former employer, to finance his race, but didn’t disclose the loan in federal campaign finance reports as required.
Cruz isn’t the first candidate and won’t be the last to misreport campaign finances. What’s more concerning for him is the optics this story presents; he has worked hard to pitch himself as a populist, but now he has to defend ties to Wall Street.
A woman mourns in Istanbul in front of the makeshift memorial in tribute to the victims of January 12 deadly attack at the tourist hub of Sultanahmet. AFP / BULENT KILIC
ON THE ISSUES | With back-to-back high-profile attacks this week in Istanbul and Jakarta that appear linked to the Islamic State, terrorism and national security remain high on the 2016 topics list.
Polls show that a large majority of Americans are fearful of another terrorist attack and doubtful of President Obama’s ability to handle it, prompting Obama to go on the offensive to highlight how much the United States is, well, on the offensive in Iraq and Syria to battle the Islamic State.
The national focus on terrorism ostensibly works in the Republican Party’s favor. GOP candidates traditionally have earned more trust on national security issues from voters than Democrats have. But the most hawkish among the bunch, Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.), dropped out of the race after the last debate. He wanted to send as many as 10,000 troops on the ground. No other candidates has gone that far, especially as Republicans recall the war-weariness that marked the drawdowns in Iraq and Afghanistan.
So although their tone will be different than Obama’s — including on whether to call it “radical Islam” — their actual proposals have in many cases not differed in big and clear ways.
BY THE NUMBERS | Watchers of the previous five Republican debates may be tiring of the exercise, but there’s one big reason to pay special attention to which candidates perform well tonight: Early state voters are paying attention, and they’re homing in on a final decision.
In 2012, two-thirds of Iowa Republican caucus-goers said they made their final decision on who to support during the final month of campaigning. That includes one-fifth who made a decision sometime during the month before the election, with the rest saying they decided in the last few days (28 percent) and 18 percent who did not decide until Election Day itself.
A big part of the reason voters wait this long to decide is that most are not paying close attention in the early debates and campaign coverage. That changes in the final stretch before voting begins, when they become more engaged. It’s in those final weeks when candidates can make strong and surprising surges: Rick Santorum’s 2012 victory in Iowa was fueled by strong support from voters who decided in the final month.
THE CONTENDERS | With just two GOP debates left before the Iowa Caucus, it’s crunch time for the seven candidates remaining on stage. Here’s what to look out for at Thursday’s debate.
1. The Trump-Haley drama
The candidates will take the stage in Charleston, S.C., just two days after the party’s front-runner was indirectly attacked by both the state’s Republican governor, Nikki Haley, and the country’s Democratic president, Barack Obama.
While it was no surprise to hear Obama being critical of Trump – or, at least, Trump-like rhetoric – it was a bit more surprising to hear Haley reveal on “The Today Show” Wednesday morning that Trump was, indeed, the target of her ire.
Perhaps the biggest question as the candidates head to another debate is whether Trump will continue to draw strength from the attacks directed at him from inside and outside his party. So far, the criticism only seems to further fire up his supporters, most of whom express some disdain for politics as usual and like his provocative, bad-boy persona. With the negative attention further inflating the Trump balloon rather than popping it, his primary opponents have tended to shy away from taking him.
2. Cruz vs. Trump: It’s on
But one candidate in particular is going after Trump hard. The Donald Trump-Ted Cruz battle is out in the open now.
Trump’s attacks on Cruz continued this week. “There is no way that Ted Cruz can continue running in the Republican primary,” he said.
And, for the first time, Cruz is openly responding. Cruz went after The Donald this week, saying he “embodies New York values” and should play Frank Sinatra’s “New York, New York” to open rallies. The Fix’s Philip Bump took offense.
3. The anti-Rubio offensive
Trump and Cruz are just the two candidates leading the Iowa polls. Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, Chris Christie, Ben Carson and John Kasich are all desperate to grab a second- or third-place finish in either Iowa or New Hampshire — or better if things really change — and as such are going after the other candidates in their weight class. This week, that meant Rubio.
It seems like every candidate not named “Marco” is going after Rubio on immigration. A brutal online ad from a super PAC supporting Cruz is perhaps the ultimate case against Rubio on this count. And a new Right to Rise (Jeb Bush’s super PAC) ad this week pokes fun at those oh-so-stylish boots, while also hammering Rubio for “flip-flopping” on his support for immigration reform.
Footwear aside, the ad goes to show how much the Bush-Rubio relationship has deteriorated. Cruz has his own anti-Rubio ad running, while Christie called Rubio a “truant” this week, referencing the Florida senator’s well-known absences from the Senate floor.
4. A smaller stage
The stage in Charleston will host the fewest candidates of any of the main GOP debates so far, with just seven candidates appearing. That will give each candidate more screen time, and more chances to go after each other directly.
With Rand Paul and Carly Fiorina off the stage, the stretch run to Iowa begins.
SOCIAL STUDIES | DJ Khaled, the guy behind the song “All I Do is Win,” thinks Jeb Bush should water his own plants and eat apples and use cocoa butter to raise his chances of becoming president:
THE CONTENDERS | Quick, tell me Donald Trump’s best moment in the first five Republican presidential debates.
Chances are, you can’t. Which is sort of remarkable, right? After all, Trump is the guy in this race who makes news. He says things about policy (we need to temporarily ban Muslims from coming to the U.S.) and about people (Jeb Bush is “low energy) that always make him the story.
Here’s how the arc of Debate Donald usually goes. Positioned in the center of the stage — it’s where he’s been in almost every debate — Trump is active, if not overwhelmingly aggressive, in the first 30-45 minutes. When answering question during that time, Trump tends to avoid any policy details and has, on occasion, shown a remarkable lack of knowledge on issues. (He had no clue what the “nuclear triad” was in the fifth debate, for example.)
But then, Trump — and I can’t believe I am writing this — tends to fade into the background. He answers the questions asked of him and hits back when someone attacks him. Beyond that, however, he tends to look somewhere between disinterested and sleepy. He does very little to inject himself into the conversation. He is, rather transparently, just waiting for the whole thing to be over.
Well, not really. At least not as it relates to Trump, whose support seems entirely disconnected from any objective handicapping of his debate performances (or anything else he does). He might be good, he might be bad — he’s much more often the latter in debates — but the people who are for him don’t care. Or Trump is able to convince them — using his megaphone via social media and cable television — that he actually won the debate no matter what the “pundits” say.
Trump has created his own reality for much of this race, never more so than in insisting how “everyone” says he won “every” debate. He hasn’t. But it hasn’t mattered. And probably won’t again tonight.
“There are criminals running around with guns who shouldn’t have them. We don’t prosecute any of them. Less than 1 percent.”
–Carly Fiorina
THE FACT CHECKER| Fiorina appears to be referring to claim we have examined before—that only 44 people (out of nearly 73,000 denials) were prosecuted in 2010 for trying to buy a gun. Almost 35,000 people had felony convictions and nearly 14,000 were fugitives, but the prosecutions amounted to just 0.06 percent of denials.
The FBI referred these cases to an arm of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), but after a review 90 percent were not deemed worthy of further investigation while another 4 percent turned out to be incorrect denials. But then even of the relatively small percentage of cases referred to ATF field offices, another quarter turned out to be a case of mistaken denial and most of the rest had no prosecutorial merit.
But it’s worth noting that these were federal cases, and prosecutors often are reluctant to conduct “paperwork prosecutions.” There is evidence in state reports that hundreds of fugitives every year are captured when they tried to buy guns. Local authorities are notified by FBI examiners that a fugitive is in a gun store, leading to an arrest and trial on the outstanding warrants. But those convictions are not captured in the federal data.
“The bottom line is, I put the original sanctions on the Iranian nuclear program when I was in the United States Senate.”
–Former senator Rick Santorum (R-Pa.)
THE FACT CHECKER | Bottom line, this is a ridiculous embellishment of the historical record.
As we have documented before, in 2004 Santorum introduced a bill to help foster democracy in Iran but it went nowhere; in 2005, he introduced a similar bill that also would have included some sanctions, but it also went nowhere. In 2006, he tried to attach the bill to a defense spending bill — and was defeated, in large part because the Bush administration opposed it, fearing it would undo delicate efforts to begin a diplomatic resolution to the nuclear standoff.
A revised version of legislation, giving the president waiver authority to terminate the sanctions with as little as a three-day notice, eventually was approved. But it’s false to claim that this bill were the “original sanctions.” In effect, the law made relatively minor modifications to the Iran and Libya Sanctions Act of 1996, which was the first law that authorized U.S. penalties against third-country companies involved in Iran’s nuclear activities.
The Congressional Research Service in a 2014 report says that no sanctions have been imposed using the sanctions section of Santorum’s law. In fact, the comprehensive CRS report, over 78 pages, barely mentions the Santorum legislation, which was relatively minor footnote in the effort to restrain Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
“It’s the smallest navy we’ve had since 1915, when my grandfather got on a destroyer in World War I when he was in the U.S. Navy.”
–Huckabee
THE FACT CHECKER | This zombie claim gets repeated in literally every GOP debate, and apparently won’t ever go away. Fact checkers repeatedly debunked this in the 2012 presidential elections, and it’s being repeated again this time around. We awarded Three Pinocchios when it re-entered the campaign rhetoric last year. So, let’s review it again.
A lot has changed in 100 years, including the need and capacity of ships. After all, it’s a now a matter of modern nuclear-powered fleet carriers, versus gunboats and small warships of 100 years ago. The push for ships under the Reagan era (to build the Navy up to 600-ship levels) no longer exists, and ships from that era are now retiring.
There are other ways to measure seapower than just the sheer number of ships, according to Navy Secretary Ray Mabus: “That’s pretty irrelevant. We also have fewer telegraph machines than we did in World War I and we seem to be doing fine without that. … Look at the capability. Look at the missions that we do.” Plus, the Navy is on track to grow to just over 300 ships, approximately the size that a bipartisan congressional panel has recommended for the current Navy.
“The hate crimes in this country — over 5,500 — about 1,100 were religious hate crimes. And of those, 58 percent were directed toward Jews. Only 16 were toward Muslims.”
–Former Gov. Mike Huckabee (R-Ark.)
THE FACT CHECKER | Huckabee’s reference to FBI’s Uniform Crime Report hate crime figures checks out. But there are some caveats to note.
The 2014 Uniform Crime Report’s hate crimes data show that of the 6,727 hate crime incidents, 1,140 were victims of anti-religious hate crimes. Of those 1,140, 56.8 percent were victims of crimes motivated by anti-Jewish bias, and 16.1 percent were victims of anti-Muslim bias.
Crime data in the Uniform Crime Report are vastly underreported, as it only captures voluntary reporting from a fraction of police jurisdictions in the country. (The FBI has promised to improve its crime tracking system, particularly on fatal police shootings, after The Washington Post revealed just how underreported the police shootings were in 2015.)
The Southern Poverty Law Center reported that anti-Muslim hate crimes have been rising since 2012, although hate crimes in general decreased in 2014. Given other figures reported in Bureau of Justice Statistics studies, the real number of hate crimes could be 25 to 40 percent higher than FBI totals, which “means the real 2014 total of anti-Muslim hate crimes could be as many as 6,000 or more,” according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.
As our Wonkblog colleagues reported, anti-Muslim hate crimes rose more than tenfold after the 9/11 attacks, and in the years since, have hovered in the 100-150 range. This is about five times higher than the rate prior to 9/11 attacks.
THE CONTENDERS | Florida Sen. Marco Rubio heads into tonight’s debate in the midst of a heated fight with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie. Christie has been getting really personal with Rubio, casting him as a truant schoolboy who doesn’t show up for his day job. Rubio has counter-punched with policy-based attacks, casting Christie as far too liberal for most Republican voters. Don’t expect this fight to cool tonight. If anything, it should escalate. After all, the two of them are fighting to be the establishment alternative to Ted Cruz and Donald Trump.
Rubio started targeting Christie and Cruz over their positions on taxes this week. In what should be a debate focused heavily on the economy, look for Rubio to bring up this contrast.
THE CONTENDERS | No, he’s not packing up and going home.
With a little more than two weeks until the Iowa caucuses, Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush plans to make a stop in New York next week to talk about foreign affairs and raise money for his campaign. Then he’s back to New Hampshire.
Bush spent less than 48 hours this week in Iowa, making four public campaign appearances and meeting briefly with state GOP lawmakers. He isn’t scheduled to be back in the Hawkeye State until closer to the the Jan. 28 Republican presidential debate in Des Moines, scheduled to be hosted by Fox News Channel.
CHARLESTON, S.C. — Hours before taking the debate stage tonight, Carly Fiorina told a crowd at the Charleston Crab House how fun it was to campaign with her husband Frank.
“You know, unlike some other women in this race, I actually like spending time with my husband,” she said.
It was the sort of line that hit dead center with conservatives, and might befuddle other audiences. Bill Clinton had joined the campaign trail again this month, stumping for his wife in Iowa and New Hampshire. The idea of the Clintons as operators united by a power-thirst that overwhelms a mutual disdain is strong on the right, and parodied on Saturday Night Live. But in recent weeks, the regular knock on the Clintons has been that they are too close; that Hillary failed to defend the women whom Bill allegedly used for sex.
Nonetheless, Fiorina kicked off her return to the undercard debate with a reprise of the joke.
Fiorina’s insurgent campaign faded this autumn after a debate-driven summer surge. Among all voters, her favorable ratings have consistently been upside down; among Republicans, she has stayed in the upper tier. Yet her return to the smaller stage deprives Republicans of a prime time female critic of Hillary Clinton, something that the party had come to appreciate. In her final main stage performance, at December’s CNN debate, Fiorina had largely stuck to discussing how Clinton “has gotten every foreign policy challenge wrong,” with no personal asides.
Fiorina’s stats are incomplete. (AP Photo/Chuck Burton)
“We have record numbers of men out of work. We have record numbers of women living in poverty.”
–Carly Fiorina
THE FACT CHECKER | This is a bizarre claim, apparently touted by right-leaning Web sites. The former corporate chief executive appears to be referring to the number of men not in the labor force. The figure in the December jobs report reached a total of 38,233,000, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
But only about 2.6 million of those men actually want a job, while a little under a million are marginally attached to the labor force (such as discouraged from seeking work). The other 34 million men are retired or simply are not interested in working, such as stay-at-home parents. So it’s highly misleading to claim that these men are “out of work.”
As for the number of women in poverty, that’s correct in terms of raw numbers, according to the census Bureau. But raw numbers are inherently misleading, as the population of the United States continues to grow. But the official poverty rate has not changed over the years. An alternative poverty rate, known as the Supplemental Poverty Measure, indicates the rate had dropped significantly since the mid-1960s.
(Note: this was originally posted regarding women out of work, but the transcript shows she referred to men. The same point still applies.)
In case you haven’t heard, Rand Paul won’t be appearing onstage tonight at either debate.
Paul, who typically appears on the main stage, was demoted to the undercard due to low polling numbers. He was not happy with this outcome, and now he’s boycotting the event altogether.
THE CONTENDERS | Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) often sends out dire-sounding campaign fundraising emails.
“LANGUAGE WARNING!!” read one. “I just found out I’m about to be hit by an avalanche — a barrage of negative print, TV, and web advertising” says another.
Ahead of the debate, Cruz’s campaign put out another one, based off a New York Times report that he failed to disclose a Goldman Sachs loan he used to fund his 2012 Senate campaign.
“Last night The New York Times wrote a disgraceful story – placing it on their front page above the fold – in a shameful attempt to not only affect tonight’s debate but also change the ultimate course of the 2016 election,” it read.
“This could prove to be the most important day of the campaign, and I need you by my side,” it said.
James Hohmann and the rest of the Post’s national political staff’s take on the big matchup tonight, which is seen as a big test for the current Iowa leader, Ted Cruz.
Will The Donald take off the gloves where Cruz is concerned, and will the Texas senator hit back? Advil, Alka-Selzter and eye drops are all on tap in South Carolina, per Karen Tumulty.
THE CONTENDERS | As Sen. Rand Paul prepares for a live online event tonight — his answer to being excluded from the Fox Business prime-time debate — a super PAC that once worried his campaign is readying some good news. Concerned American Voters, run by former Freedomworks president Matt Kibbe and Young Americans for Liberty President Jeff Frazee, raised about $3 million in the third fundraising quarter. All of that has been pointed at voter contact efforts in the Iowa and Nevada caucuses. And in an interview, Frazee suggested that the campaign had identified enough potential Paul supporters to win the caucuses.
“We’re waiting for Rand to catch fire,” Frazee said. “If that happens in Iowa, there are millions of dollars sitting on the sidelines, waiting for him.”
Concerned American Voters got off the ground in June, and since then it has made 1.1 million voter contacts in Iowa to identify 37,352 likely caucus goers. They’ve been marked as certain to support, likely to support, or maybe to support Paul. (Frazee did not go into detail on the size of each sector.)
In the event that all of those voters, or just four in five of them, turned out for Paul, the candidate will have wildly defied the polls and possibly won the caucuses. In his hair’s breadth 2012 caucus victory, former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum did not quite win 30,000 votes. Yet Paul, said Frazee, really and truly had built on his father’s 2012 Iowa network. He had more caucus captains, 1,019, then anyone else who had announced them; he had, through Concerned American Voters, a grass-roots organization in no danger of flipping to anyone else.
What neither Frazee nor Paul knew was how the candidate’s decision to boycott tonight’s debate would affect that base. Concerned American Voters was not the first outside group to pledge a grass-roots, voter-dragging campaign; Billionaire and poker player Andy Beal, Whole Foods founder John Mackey, billionaire options trader Jeffrey Yass and original Uber investor Scott Banister. In the 48 hours since his boycott announcement, Paul had received the most intense media coverage since a pre-Trump heyday.
“I think it helps with activists,” said Matt Kibbe. “I haven’t talked to any donors yet, but one thing we’ve always wanted to do is raise money from small ‘l’ libertarians, and what they want is for Rand to be himself. He’s sort of been unleashed.”
Paul, meanwhile, is continuing the media tour. He appeared on “The Daily Show” for the first time Wednesday night, taking part in a “singles debate” with new host Trevor Noah. And before his town hall, he’ll make a return appearance on MSNBC’s “Hardball.”
An online invitation to Rand Paul’s Thursday night town hall.
It’s unclear whether Paul will make the main stage in the next Republican debate, to be hosted by Fox News in Des Moines on Jan. 28.
The seven top Republicans — sorry Rand Paul! — will gather tonight in North Charleston, S.C., for their sixth presidential debate, and the first of 2016.
Donald Trump, left, and Ted Cruz. (John Locher/AP)
1. Donald Trump vs. Ted Cruz
The billionaire and the Texas senator have played very nice with each other over the first five debates — believing it was in their mutual best interests to be friends.
It’s no longer in their mutual best interests to be friends. Cruz and Trump are locked in a tight battle in Iowa, and Cruz has moved into second place nationally behind The Donald.
Trump has spent the last week hitting Cruz on questions regarding whether his Canadian birthplace means he can’t serve as president — attacks that have distracted the Texas senator and taken him off-course in the run-up to Iowa. Cruz, after trying to laugh off the attack, has — finally — decided to go after Trump. “I think he may shift in his new rallies to playing ‘New York, New York,’ because Donald comes from New York, and he embodies New York values,” Cruz told a conservative radio host earlier this week.
Trump will certainly go after Cruz on the citizenship question on Thursday night. And Cruz will certainly have a prepared answer.
Which wins the day: the attack or the rebuttal?
2. Marco Rubio vs. Chris Christie
The battle for the establishment lane — in Iowa and New Hampshire — may well come down to the Florida senator and the New Jersey governor. Sensing that, the two have already begun to spar — rhetorically and via competing TV ads.
Christie will cast Rubio as a lightweight — politically and from a policy perspective. “The guy who advocated for amnesty and then ran away when the topic got too hot tells you two things: He’s not a reliable conservative — A — and B, whenever it gets too hot, Marco turns tail and runs,” Christie told The Washington Post earlier this month.
This matchup is all the more intriguing because of the stylistic contrast between the two men. Both are charismatic and gifted communicators who think well on their feet. But where Christie is brash, Rubio is by-the-book. Which style wins out tonight?
(It should also be noted here that Rubio is also taking incoming from a super PAC supporting Cruz and also from Jeb Bush. So those conflicts could flare up too.)
3. Jeb Bush vs. Trump
For every debate since the first one, Jeb(!) Bush has needed “a moment.” He’s had varying levels of success at achieving that goal — Bush was good in the last debate, he was terrible in the third, for example — but nothing has seemed to move the needle for him.
So I think we should all move beyond the “can Jeb find his moment” moment. Instead, keep an eye on how aggressive Jeb is against Trump. For the past month — at least — Jeb has been the most consistent and outspoken critic of The Donald. And, on Thursday, he launched an ad blasting Trump for the latter’s comments about a disabled reporter.
Here’s the key for Jeb: In the past, he’s pulled his punches when facing his rivals face to face. (See: Rubio vs. Jeb in October’s debate.) That won’t work against Trump. Bush has to be willing to talk over Trump, get nasty and, well, street fight. I’m not convinced he has it in him.
4. John Kasich vs. John Kasich
The Ohio governor’s performances in the debates have varied widely. After a strong start to debate season, Kasich seemed to get some bad advice in the fourth debate — butting in at every turn and generally coming across as, well, a jerk. Kasich, perhaps fazed by the criticism after that performance, was more measured — almost to the point of leaving no trace — in the fifth debate.
Kasich remains relevant in the broader conversation because he continues to look like a player in the establishment lane in New Hampshire. (The Real Clear Politics polling average puts him in a statistical dead heat with Rubio for second.)
But he has to find his/the right voice in a debate setting — and fast. Tonight marks the first of three debates before the Feb. 9 New Hampshire primary. (There’s a debate on Jan. 28 in Iowa and one on Feb. 6 in New Hampshire.) He needs to do it by then.
5. Neil Cavuto and Maria Bartiromo vs. the candidates
If I’ve learned anything during the previous five Republican presidential debates, it’s that the moderators — and what role they see for themselves — are very much part of who wins and who loses in the final assessment.
Cruz, for example, effectively launched his current hot streak when he slammed the moderators at the CNBC debate for allegedly avoiding policy questions in favor of trying to start fights between the candidates. (Irony alert: Cruz refused to answer a policy question in order to deliver that screed.)
Bartiromo and Cavuto were part of a generally well-reviewed debate back in November, but they are promising more aggression and fireworks tonight. “I think when you can pin a candidate down — ‘Are you against any type of gun control at all, would you restrict guns or background checks at all in any area?’ — you hope to get some answers to crystallize where they’re coming from,” Cavuto told Politico.
How the candidates interact with the two moderators and how aggressive the moderators are in pushing for real answers to tough questions will play a major factor in choosing winners and losers tonight.
Less friendly this time around? (AP Photo/John Locher)
The smallest — and most desperate — “undercard” debate of the Republican presidential campaign beginsat 6 p.m. Eastern on Thursday, followed by a main debate in which front-runners Donald Trump and Sen. Ted Cruz will face each other for the first time since their unofficial alliance unravelled.
The undercard will include three candidates that have tasted success — and then lost it. There will be former tech executive Carly Fiorina, who rose to prominence after the first undercard and then faded. And there will be former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee and former senator Rick Santorum (Pa.), the last two winners of the GOP’s Iowa caucuses, who’ve had no luck rekindling that magic in this race.
Now, with this year’s caucuses looming next month, all three are running out of time.
The undercard, like the main event, will be televised on Fox Business Network. The debates are being held in North Charleston, S.C., a key early-voting state.
At the main debate, which begins at 9 p.m., viewers will see a race that has split into two bitter mini-battles. One is between Iowa front-runners Donald Trump and Sen. Ted Cruz, whose old truce unravelled into insult-trading this week.
The other battle is between everybody else: a universe of candidates hovering in the single digits or low teens, all focused on taking each other out.
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