2024 hopefuls argued over education, spending and border security.
The second Republican debate of the 2024 presidential primary, taking place at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, has just come to an end.
The affair was more raucous than the first debate, which took place over a month ago. Candidates interrupted one another much more regularly and several — most notably former Vice President Mike Pence and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie — have directly criticized front-runner Donald Trump, who elected not to show up tonight. The two candidates from South Carolina, former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley and Sen. Tim Scott, went after one another for their records on spending, and seemingly everyone who had the chance to take a shot at entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy did so.
Read below for highlights, excerpts and key moments.
After mixing it up with her earlier, Scott goes out of his way to attack Haley again. He very much wants to be in her position — rising in the national polls, in second place in New Hampshire in some polls — right now.
—Analysis by Nathaniel Rakich of 538
Pence and Trump keep trying to claim they passed the largest tax cuts in American history as if one time it might be true.
It is not.
In inflation-adjusted dollars, the 2017 tax bill is the fourth-largest since 1940. And as a percentage of GDP, it ranks seventh.
-Analysis by Aaron Sharockman, PolitiFact
Foreign policy isn’t quite dominating this debate, but U.S. policy towards China is a prominent theme, and Ramaswamy is bearing down a lot of attacks on that.
Ramaswamy and Haley had a heated moment on the debate stage over the issue of support for Ukraine – which Haley tied to China. When Ramaswamy argued against support for Ukraine, Haley jumped in, saying that a win for Russia is a win for China, and then accused Ramaswamy of liking China.
There was also the memorable TikTok exchange between the two. Haley sniped at Ramaswamy that "every time I hear you, I feel a little bit dumber for what you say” and that he can't be trusted as he justified his choice to join TikTok after being convinced by influencer and boxer Jake Paul to join despite previously calling it "digital fentanyl." TikTok was created by Chinese company ByteDance and lawmakers have scrutinized the app over security concerns. (Ads for TikTok are also airing on Fox Business Network during commercial breaks.)
Scott also accused Ramaswamy of being ‘bought’ by China. He was likely referencing Ramaswamy's company, Roivant Sciences, announcing 5-years ago that it was partnering with China state-owned investment company CITIC Group Corp
And Pence had a similar, pointed attack: “I'm glad Vivek pulled out of his business deal in 2018 in China -- that must have been about the time you decided to start voting in presidential elections."
It’s worth noting that Haley criticized Trump too on this front, in that case for not pursuing China aggressively enough on a host of issues: “This is where President Trump went wrong.”
– ABC News’ Kendall Ross, Libby Cathey, Soorin Kim, Abby Cruz, Nicholas Kerr, and Oren Oppenheim
Abortion was a big topic in last month’s debate, so we asked about it specifically in this month’s pre-debate 538/Washington Post/Ipsos poll. We asked if a new federal law banning abortion after six weeks of pregnancy except in the case of rape, incest, or when the mother's life is in danger, to which 57 percent of likely Republican primary voters said that they’d support the policy and 36 percent said they’d oppose it (8 percent didn’t know or skipped the question).
However, when we asked who they think should make the decision whether a woman can have an abortion, 54 percent said the decision should be left to the woman and her doctor, while 44 percent said abortion should be regulated by law.
—Analysis by Holly Fuong of 538
