Christie again focused on his record as New Jersey governor when asked about how he'd address shootings and gun violence plaguing the nation.

He accused prosecutors of not arresting violent criminals and said a "President Christie" would appoint attorney general to instruct U.S. attorney to do so.

"We have plenty of room in the federal prisons to lock up these violent criminals and clean up what's going on all across this country and these individuals," Christie said.

During the abortion back-and-forth, Pence claimed that 70 percent of Americans support a 15-week abortion ban. He’s cherry picking the results from one poll.

A 2022 survey from the Center for American Political Studies at Harvard University and The Harris Poll asked respondents, "Do you think your state should allow abortion…?”

Twenty-three percent said up to 15 weeks, 12 percent said up to six weeks and 37 percent said only in cases of rape and incest. That’s 72 percent all together. But answers in surveys vary greatly depending on how the question is asked.

A 2022 Economist/YouGov poll asked specifically about a 15-week ban — 39 percent supported it, 46 percent opposed it. A 2023 PBS NewsHour/NPR/Marist poll asked respondents whether abortion should be allowed up until 24 weeks — 44 percent said yes.

-Aaron Sharockman, PolitiFact

Pence and Ramaswamy trading barbs. Pence opens with America being a faith-filled country without an identity crisis, while Ramaswamy says we're in a dark place and it's not morning in America. It echoed Trump's "American carnage" during his first inaugural address.
-Analysis by Monica Potts of FiveThirtyEight

Because there was so much chatter on Pence's support of a 15-week abortion ban, I asked Fivey Fox (aka FiveThirtyEight's Senior Researcher) to pull all the polls we've collected on the subject since September 2021. Over that whole time period Americans were split 44-44 on the issue, but in polls conducted this year they are opposed 51-41.
-Analysis by G Elliott Morris of FiveThirtyEight

Money isn’t the be-all-and-end-all of political campaigns — but it sure helps, especially during the early phases of a primary. And in the 2024 pocketbook primary, the leaders so far are Trump (who raised $17.7 million in April, May and June) and DeSantis (who raised $20.1 million). These figures are striking, but you also have to account for how much time each candidate has been in the race. For instance, DeSantis jumped in in late May, so he had much less time in which to raise that money than Trump. Here’s a chart of who raised the most in the second quarter on a prorated basis.

But there’s also important context that those topline fundraising numbers don’t tell you. For instance, Burgum’s and Ramaswamy’s totals aren’t as impressive as they look — most of their fundraising came from their own wallets rather than from grassroots donors. Burgum self-funded $10.1 million of his $11.8 million haul, and Ramaswamy self-funded $5.0 million of his $7.7 million total.

On the other end of the spectrum, Scott is in better financial shape than his $5.9 million raised would suggest. That’s because he has more than $21 million cash on hand, thanks to money he carried over from his high-rolling Senate campaigns.

-Analysis by Nathaniel Rakich of FiveThirtyEight