Cleveland
In the first Republican debate of the 2016 presidential campaign, frontrunner Donald Trump spoke for two minutes more than anyone else on stage, a fact that provided a distinct advantage for the other nine candidates on stage. Trump’s performance here tonight was part populist bravado, part indignant defensiveness—and a whole lot of incoherence. Trump opened the debate by refusing to pledge his support for the Republican nominee.
When Chris Wallace asked for specific evidence of Trump’s claim that the Mexican government is sending criminals northward, Trump responded that U.S. government officials are “stupid.” Trump said he’d long been opposed to “the concept of abortion” – as if the procedure is merely theoretical. And his answer on how he would respond to Iranian General Qassem Suleimani breaking U.N. sanctions and travel restrictions was little more than a series of occasionally related words. It was the kind of performance that would probably sink a normal politician. But thus far, Trump’s style has mattered more than his substance – or lack of it – and he’s proven remarkably durable. Still, while Trump won the stopwatch and was involved in several fiery exchanges, with both his rivals and the moderators, he didn’t dominate the debate the way many of the rival campaigns had feared beforehand.
Instead, several of those who came into the debate ranked near the bottom of the top ten, turned in the strongest performances of the night. Marco Rubio (#7) consistently gave strong and substantive answers that at times emphasized the compelling story of his family and at others demonstrated his depth of knowledge on the subject matter discussed. He told the audience that he would not be lectured by Hillary Clinton on the struggles of modern American families. “If I’m our nominee, how is Hillary Clinton going to lecture me about living paycheck to paycheck? I was raised paycheck to paycheck. How is she — how is she going to lecture me — how is she going to lecture me about student loans? I owed over $100,000 just four years ago.” If the debate had a winner, it was Rubio.
Chris Christie (#9) was involved in two candidate-on-candidate exchanges and arguably won them both. In the first, he and Rand Paul battled over the kind of surveillance required to disrupt terrorist threats. Paul declared: “I want to collect more records from terrorists, but less records from innocent Americans. The Fourth Amendment was what we fought the Revolution over!” Christie, turning to moderator Megyn Kelly, responded with mockery: “That’s a completely ridiculous answer. ‘I want to collect more records from terrorists, but less records from other people.’ How are you supposed to know, Megyn?”
In the other exchange, Christie and Mike Huckabee debated entitlement reform. Christie framed the problem as an urgent crisis and then methodically took the crowd through the specifics of his entitlement reform proposals – or as many as he could mention in a minute. “I’m the only guy on this stage who’s put out a detailed, 12 point plan on entitlement reform and here’s why – because 71 percent of federal spending right now is on entitlements, and debt service. 71 percent,” he said, before explaining that he would gradually raise the retirement age for Social Security recipients and means test the benefits.
The other candidate who appeared to do well was Ohio governor John Kasich (#10), who was able to use his answers to return to the core message of his campaign: an updated compassionate conservatism. He gave a thoughtful, faith-focused answer to a question about gay marriage and aggressively defended his decision to expand Medicaid in Ohio. The answers were very well-received by the audience here in Kasich’s home state and by political reporters on Twitter. But Kasich got a standing ovation when he was introduced and the audience applauded several times at the mere mention of his name. If the debate had been held in, say, New Mexico, perceptions about enthusiasm for his answers would no doubt be quite different. Will Kasich’s style of balanced-budget, big-government conservatism sell more broadly?
Scott Walker was solid but not spectacular. He spoke with an almost casual style and his closing statement played up the characterization of him as “aggressively normal.” He did not have many opportunities to drive his message of “big, bold reforms,” so he used his closing statement to emphasize his record.
Ben Carson made little impact throughout most of the debate, but recovered with a thoughtful answer to a question about race and a very funny closing statement.
Jeb Bush had some good moments – defending his goal of 4 percent growth, explaining his education reforms in response to a question about Common Core. But for a candidate regarded as a would-be frontrunner, he was unsteady and came off as a candidate terrified of making a mistake. That halting delivery led to several awkward moments that detracted some from answers that were often substantively strong.
The most impressive performance of the day may well have come in the junior debate at 5 p.m., where Carly Fiorina dominated her rivals and emerged as a clear and obvious winner. Her commanding performance won wide praise before it was even over and is certain to give her a boost in coverage in the coming days. Will it also mean a bump in national polls and, specifically, a bump big enough to move her into the top ten for the Reagan Library debate on September 16? It might, but even if it doesn’t, it’s hard to imagine how she could be left off the stage in that debate following a dominating showing in this one.
