Eight contenders for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination jockeyed for voters’ attention on Wednesday at the party’s first debate, absent the front-runner Donald Trump, the former president, who bypassed the event.
In his first political debate, Vivek Ramaswamy, 38, was widely expected to be a wild card. He quickly found out that fire brings fire.
Mike Pence, 64, defending his four-year record as Trump’s vice president, was the first to try to cut Ramaswamy down to size. “We don’t need to bring in a rookie, we don’t need to bring in people without experience,” Pence said. “I’ve had enough, already tonight, of a guy who sounds like ChatGPT standing up here,” Christie said.“And the last person in one of these debates . . . who stood in the middle of the stage and said, ‘What’s a skinny guy with an odd last name doing up here,’ was Barack Obama. And I’m afraid we’re dealing with the same type of amateur standing on the stage tonight,” Christie said.Not only did Trump skip the debate, he counter-programmed it.
By and large, they fell into predictable patterns. Pence defended certifying the electoral vote in the U.S. Congress despite pressure from Trump. Christie, Trump’s most persistent critic, said his conduct was beneath “the office of president.” DeSantis argued the party needed to focus on the future. “We have to look at the fact that three quarters of Americans don’t want a rematch between Trump and Biden,” said Haley, 51. “And we have to face the fact that Trump is the most disliked politician in America. We can’t win a general election that way.
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