Republican debate highlights and analysis: Fiery faceoff on Trump, Ukraine and more
The 2024 hopefuls took the stage in Milwaukee on Wednesday night, without Trump.
The first Republican debate of the 2024 presidential primary was held in Milwaukee on Wednesday night.
Eight candidates qualified for a spot on the stage: North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, former Vice President Mike Pence, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy and South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott.
Missing from the event was the primary's early front-runner: former President Donald Trump, who declined to participate and instead released a pre-recorded interview with Tucker Carlson.
ABC News and FiveThirtyEight live-blogged every major moment and highlight from the debate, aired on Fox News, with FiveThirtyEight providing analysis and a closer look at the polling and data behind the politicians. PolitiFact made real-time fact checks of key statements.
Read deeper:
Abortion hasn't just been a losing issue at the ballot for Republicans: Since the Dobbs decision, more Americans are supporting more liberal views on abortion than they have in decades. More Americans want abortion to be legal in most cases, and more Americans are suspicious of restrictions. The share of Americans who want abortion to be legal in the first trimester is 60 percent, according to Gallup.
-Analysis by Monica Potts of FiveThirtyEight
Haley first to drop Trump’s name during debate
Haley was the first participant to name Trump during the debate, referring to the amount that was added to the nation's debt under the former president, who also oversaw the sweeping response to the unprecedented COVID-19 pandemic and a major tax cut.
-ABC News’ Abby Cruz
Since Roe vs. Wade was overturned, a number of Republican-led states have passed laws that prohibit abortion after 6 weeks of pregnancy or when a fetal heartbeat can be detected (though many of these laws have been blocked in court). According to June polling from Harris Poll for the Harvard University Center for American Political Studies, Republicans favor similar laws in their states by a margin of 30 percentage points (65 percent support and 35 percent oppose).
-Analysis by FiveThirtyEight
DeSantis demurs on a national six-week abortion ban
DeSantis brushed off concerns that his signing a six-week abortion ban in Florida will hurt him on the national stage.
"I would say we sold the biggest election landslide victory in the history of the Republican party and the state of Florida in 2022," DeSantis countered. "That's what I did. We can win."
DeSantis argued "we're better than what the Democrats are selling" but ultimately demurred on whether he'd support a six-week ban at the national level.
"I will stand on the side of life," he responded.
Will anything change following the first primary debate?
I think Geoffrey has this exactly right: It seemed a little like the candidates were playing pretend tonight by ignoring Trump. But they’re in a tough position, politically. Someone needs to go after Trump in order to open up space for another potential nominee, but going after Trump is also extremely unattractive to GOP voters. That combination keeps Trump in a strong position as the front-runner.
At this point, the question isn’t who will be the alternative to Trump, but whether Republicans will produce an alternative nominee to Trump at all. DeSantis needed to prove tonight that he could live up to the initial hype around him, that he was Republicans’ clear alternative to nominating Trump. But there didn’t seem to be a breakout moment for him. A handful of others — like Haley and Pence — had some strong moments, but we’ll have to wait for polling to see whether those actually resonated with voters. Otherwise, it’s more of the same – which is good news for Trump.
-Analysis by Leah Askarinam of FiveThirtyEight