The third Republican presidential primary debate has once again largely revolved around former President Donald Trump. Unlike other occasions, when the former president was barely mentioned until well into the debate, the moderators have had the good sense to start by asking about him. And the candidates, starting with Ron DeSantis and Nikki Haley, have decided to go on the attack against the former president, as they had already begun to do in the second debate. The strategy of temporizing and limiting criticism has not worked for them so far. It remains to be seen if the turn serves them well.
The debate was scheduled for the day after a partial election in which Democrats have obtained important victories in Iowa, Kentucky and Virginia, which has given rise to the candidates to criticize the current situation of the party. When asked why Trump supporters should turn their backs on the former president and support them, DeSantis, Haley and Christie have gone straight into the attack.
“If you look at where we are now, it’s very different from where we were in 2016 and Donald Trump is a very different guy than he was in 2016,” DeSantis said. “It is up to you to be on this stage and explain why he should get another chance. He should explain why he didn’t make Mexico pay for the border wall. You should explain why you accumulated so much debt. Should explain why he didn’t drain the swamp [una referencia a la corrupción y burocracia de Washington] and said that the Republicans were going to get tired of winning. We already saw what happened last night. I’m tired of Republicans losing. Here in Florida I showed a year ago how it’s done,” he added, recalling his spectacular results in his re-election as governor.
Haley started with diplomacy, but quickly went for the jugular. “I think he was the right president at the right time. I don’t think he’s the right president now. He put us in debt of 8 billion dollars and our children will never forgive us. I think he used to be right on Ukraine and on foreign affairs and now he is getting weak in the knees and trying to be friendly again, I think we have to get back to the fact that we can’t live in the past. We cannot live in other headlines. We have to start focusing on what is going to make America strong and proud. And that’s what I’m focused on,” she said.
Trumpist Vivek Ramaswamy has avoided direct attack on the president, but has attacked the party apparatus and the media. “We have become a party of losers,” he said, before one of his bench exits in which he said that the moderators of the debate should be the extremist Tucker Carlson and the businessman Elon Musk.
Chris Christie, for his part, has said that Trump was going to spend the next year more focused on his problems in court. In his case, he has attacked the former president since the first debate, so it was not a big news. Tim Scott, on the other hand, has avoided open criticism of the former president.
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The debate has immediately turned to foreign policy. The candidates have competed over who was most critical of Hamas and most supportive of Israel, except for Ramaswamy, who went off on a tangent again: “Do you want a leader from a different generation who will put this country first? Or do they want Dick Cheney in four-inch heels? In that case, we have two of them on stage tonight,” Ramaswamy said, invoking the former vice president in what seemed like an attack on Haley and DeSantis, who has been said to wear elevators on his shoes to appear taller. Haley has revolted: “They’re 6-inch heels, and I don’t wear them unless he can run in them. They are not fashion: they are ammunition.” And he then took advantage of a question about Ukraine, in which Ramaswamy was against delivering more aid to Kiev, to hit back: “Putin and Xi are salivating at the idea of this guy being president. “They would love it,” he said.
Haley and Christie have shown themselves to be the most favorable to the prominence of the United States in foreign policy. DeSantis, after his attack against Hamas, has avoided commenting on support for Ukraine, saying that he would not send troops there but to the border with Mexico.
[Noticia de última hora. Habrá ampliación en breve]
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