Outside of the segment on Trump's indictments and his behavior on Jan. 6, it's been a bit surprising that there's been little discussion of him otherwise. There've been a few references to actions taken prior to Biden taking office, indirectly involving Trump, but not much specifically about him. That has turned this debate into something of an alternative universe where these are the main eight candidates, not the eight who are badly trailing the main guy not in the room.
-Analysis by Geoffrey Skelley of FiveThirtyEight

Yeah, Maya, I am surprised Trump didn’t come up more. With him not on stage, I actually thought it would be easier for the candidates to swipe at him, since there was no risk of him punching directly back. But with some notable exceptions, like Christie and Hutchinson (and even then, only on a couple occasions), the candidates showed little interest in hammering away at the primary front-runner. I think that’s a questionable strategy since none of these candidates will be able to earn majority support in the primary without stealing some of it from Trump.
-Analysis by Nathaniel Rakich of FiveThirtyEight

Sixty-eight percent of Americans think the government is withholding information about UFOs, and three-fourths think there is some form of life on other planets. The number of Americans who suspect UFOs have been spotted has also increased, and 41 percent believe that some spotted UFOs are alien spacecraft. This has only been increased in recent years with Navy pilots reporting strange sightings over the past decade, along with recent congressional hearings about the issue.
-Analysis by Monica Potts of FiveThirtyEight

Christie was seen smiling and shaking his head as Fox News moderator Martha MacCallum began to ask about UFO ecounters.

"I get the UFO question? Come on, man!" Christie said.

"I think it's horrible that just because I'm from New Jersey, you asked me about unidentified flying objects and martians," he continued. "We're different but we're not that different."

Tonight I’m on Pence and Hutchinson duty. Neither candidate appears to have a great shot at winning the primary — the former vice president is at 4 percent in FiveThirtyEight’s national polling average while the former Arkansas governor hasn’t even garnered 1 percent — but Pence at least has a decent chance of making a debate-night splash. Given the events of Jan. 6, 2021, Pence has the strongest claim to the anti-Trump “lane” of the primary. I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw some real fireworks between him and the GOP candidates who have been quick to jump to Trump’s defense after the bad news he has been hit with over the past year. For his part, Hutchinson will have to pull off a masterclass in persuasion and performance to gain substantial ground. In our poll with Ipsos and The Washington Post, only 6 percent of Republicans said they were even considering voting for him, much less were intending to do so. In a more fluid primary, he’d maybe have a shot at doing something about that. But with Trump as the default and other candidates leading the various anti-Trump lanes, those are really tough numbers to come back from.

–Analysis from G. Elliott Morris_