Four Republican presidential candidates will take the stage in Tuscaloosa, Alabama tonight for the fourth GOP presidential debate. Tonight’s debate represents one of the last chances to shake up the race – currently dominated by Donald Trump – before the Iowa Caucuses.
Summary
Four Republican presidential candidates will take the stage in Tuscaloosa, Alabama tonight for the fourth GOP presidential debate. Tonight’s debate represents one of the last chances to shake up the race – currently dominated by Donald Trump – before the Iowa Caucuses.
- Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former UN Amb. Nikki Haley, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, and Vivek Ramaswamy were the only candidates who qualified for the stage after Sen. Tim Scott and North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum dropped out.
- The debate will be moderated by NewsNation anchor Elizabeth Vargas, podcaster and former Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly, and Eliana Johnson, the editor-in-chief of the Washington Free Beacon. The moderators plan to make Trump central to the debate whether he attends or not.
- The debate will air on NewsNation from 8 to 10pm ET and is co-sponsored by the Washington Free Beacon, SiriusXM’s “The Megyn Kelly Show,” and Rumble.
- While the debates have not shaken Trump’s grip on the lead in GOP primary polling, they have helped shake up the race for second place. Haley has surged into second place thanks to her debate performances, while Ramaswamy’s campaign has collapsed after his performances in the first three contests.
- The New York Times profiled Megyn Kelly on her return to the presidential debate stage eight years after famously clashing with Trump at a 2015 presidential primary debate. Her return to the debate stage is a milestone for Kelly after her departure from NBC in 2018 and her later reemergence as a highly-rated news podcaster with a show on SiriusXM.
- CNN charted a plausible route to the nomination for Haley, who’s surged to second place in two early states thanks to her strong debate performances. In theory, if Haley can secure momentum out of Iowa she could pull off upsets in New Hampshire and South Carolina. However, the bottom line is that there is a pathway for Haley, though it’s a long and tough one. She will need to mount a lot of comebacks. There’s a reason no one has successfully traversed that pathway before.”
- NBC News reported “some Republicans who want to see a Trump alternative are considering an alternative strategy to upend him: have one of his rivals finish in a convincing second place and be the last person standing should Trump have to exit the race. A handful of GOP donors and strategists acknowledged in recent conversations with NBC News that insiders are starting to put more stock in a strong second-place finish, thinking that, should Trump’s legal woes or his advanced age catch up to him, the next best finisher would have the most legitimate claim to be the nominee at next year’s convention.”
- National Review’s Jim Geraghty offered some “advice DeSantis and Haley don’t want to hear” ahead of tonight’s debate: “Another six weeks of attempting to trash the other is only going to increase the already-high odds of Trump’s becoming the nominee. So why not skip the mutually assured destruction-like dynamic, the fight to be the last non-Trump candidate standing, and work out a unity ticket?”
- Breitbart noted Haley enters the debate “riding high on a key endorsement from the powerful Koch family and $250,000 from LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, a major Democratic donor.” Haley stands at second place in New Hampshire and South Carolina, while DeSantis has maintained his hold on the runner-up spot in Iowa.
- Fox News summarized the town hall with Iowa voters that Trump attended last night instead of debating his primary rivals. Hosted by Sean Hannity, Trump attacked President Joe Biden and vowed to avenge his 2016 defeat and win the Iowa Caucus.
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© Dominic Moore, 2023
