SIMI VALLEY, Calif. — Republican presidential contenders rumbled Wednesday in prime time, sparring with each other over issues, leadership and personalities during a nearly three-hour televised debate on the campus of the Ronald Reagan Presidential library.
Eleven candidates took the stage in front of Reagan’s Air Force One jet, but the CNN moderators opened the spectacle by focusing on one: front-runner Donald Trump, the billionaire businessman and entertainer who has roiled the race with unorthodox yet often successful attacks on his competitors. For the first time, they refused to cede the stage, with Jeb Bush, Scott Walker and especially Carly Fiorina challenging Trump on the issues and on his insults.
“You know, I think Mr. Trump is a wonderful entertainer. He’s been terrific at that business,” Fiorina said early in the evening. “I also think that one of the benefits of a presidential campaign is the character and capability, judgment and temperament of every single one of us is revealed over time and under pressure. All of us will be revealed over time and under pressure. I look forward to a long race.”
Indeed, although other candidates had solid moments, Fiorina, who is number five in the Washington Examiner‘s presidential power rankings, might have gained the most in the second presidential debate of the 2016 campaign.
The former CEO of Hewlett-Packard who had run only two campaigns before seeking the presidency commanded the television cameras and made an articulate case for how she would lead the country and the world if she won the White House in 2016. She also put Trump on the defensive, a rarity in the campaign thus far, forcing him to backtrack on comments he made suggesting she was too ugly to be president.
“I think she’s got a beautiful face and I think she’s a beautiful woman,” Trump said.
The marathon, nearly three-hour, debate rewarded candidates who have sparred with Trump over summer, either directly or indirectly. CNN’s Jake Tapper repeatedly went back to Fiorina, Bush, retired pediatric neurosurgeon Ben Carson, and others who have fought or contrasted themselves with Trump in recent weeks.
That set up mini debates between Trump and Bush on immigration; Fiorina and Trump on Russia policy and how to deal with Vladimir Putin; and Marco Rubio and Trump on the Florida senator missing votes in Washington to campaign. Tapper also goaded Texas Sen. Ted Cruz into a debate with Ohio Gov. John Kasich over whether President Obama’s deal with Iran should be ripped up by the next president (Cruz would, Kasich wouldn’t).
“This deal abandons four American hostages in Iran, and this deal will only accelerate Iran’s acquiring nuclear weapons. You’d better believe it. If I am elected president, on the very first day in office, I will rip to shreds this catastrophic Iranian nuclear deal,” Cruz said.
“A lot of our problems in the world today is that we don’t have the relationship with our allies,” Kasich countered. “Now, this agreement, we don’t know what’s going to happen in 18 months. I served on the Defense Committee for 18 years. I’ve seen lots of issues in foreign affairs, and foreign — in terms of global politics, you have to be steady.”
As in Cleveland, Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida and Ted Cruz of Texas made the most of their camera time. Each had a plan and a strategy going into the Reagan library debate — a significant portion of which includes not getting distracted by what their competitors are doing. Each delivered articulate, forceful performances that stuck to the plan and almost assuredly satisfied supporters.
“We had a good night so I’m not going to complain the debate format,” Rubio spokesman Alex Conant said. “Obviously he was in the middle of the pack in terms of how much time he had; everybody wants to have more time, especially when you’re as gifted a communicator as Marco Rubio.”
The debate marked a potential second inflection point in the race since the Republicans first met in Cleveland last month, and was potentially a crucial moment for many of the participants.
Bush and Walker both had to arrest concerns among supporters that voters were losing interest and leaving the one-time frontrunner candidates behind in favor of others. Particularly among their extended inner circles of supporters, anxiety was high that failure on Wednesday could be a dagger to their presidential prospects. On this front, Bush could have reason to feel the most pleased with how things went.
He received more camera time than Walker — and he took full advantage. Bush was energized and forceful. He even finally had an answer when Trump attacked him by linking the Floridian to the unpopular presidency of his brother, George W. Bush, saying without hesitation that President Obama’s predecessor kept America safe after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and that he was proud of that.
Bush’s aggressive tangling with Trump and others should satisfy the internal harping among Bush loyalists and donors who wanted to see a more fight from their candidate after he absorbed attack after attack over the summer.
“I don’t know if anything short of the rapture will make everybody happy,” said Bush campaign spokesman Michael Steel. “But I think that he clearly won the debate; it was an incredibly strong performance and it should put to rest a lot of the attacks from Donald Trump.”
Walker showed more assertiveness, fire and execution than he did in Cleveland, and his inner circle might walk away feeling that his performance was something the governor’s team can build on as he attempts to reset his campaign from a difficult summer. But Walker was near the bottom in talk time.
He received fewer opportunities than other candidates, but he was not as effective as others — notably Fiorina — at pushing himself into the conversation. That at least somewhat overshadowed what he did accomplish, especially early in the debate when he injected himself into the conversation without being asked a question and went after Trump while making the case for his candidacy as a proven and tested leader, a major goal of his for the evening.
The Walker campaign claimed victory in the debate. But the governor made an appearance in the spin room at the Reagan library after the event, usually a sign that things did not go quite as well as hoped. Walker’s situation was more urgent than Bush’s, whose numbers in state and national polls have sagged but not nosedived since the last debate, as have Walker’s.
“His performance was flawless, he did not make a mistake,” Walker adviser Robert C. O’Brien said. “No. 2, no one laid a glove on him. Every other candidate had a glove laid on him.”
The rest of the field conducted themselves well enough. Kasich, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee delivered workmanlike performances — and shined in moments.
But they didn’t necessarily command the attention they were hoping to going into the debate. That could be a problem for Paul, who also has seen a steep drop in support since the summer. However, there was less pressure on Christie and Kasich, who have been holding solid — and in Kasich’s case, rising — in New Hampshire, where their campaigns are focused.
The mystery is how to assess Trump and Carson, two rising outsiders who have dominated state and national polls and have seemed immune to the immutable laws of political physics.
Carson made no major errors but did not have the kind of breakthrough moment, as he did at the conclusion of the first debate in Cleveland. And while Trump was the center of attention, the elevated stature and performance of his competitors left him looking not quite like the dominating figure he was last month. Trump’s strength has been that he’s out-fought the others and controlled the terms of the campaign.
That didn’t happen Wednesday night.
“I think the format’s a little difficult, this particular format. Not just 11 people but this, back and forth and pitting people against one another,” Carson spokesman Doug Watts said. “In the end, the metrics that matter are how the American people view it, not how you or other pundits or myself or other consultants would look at it.”
Disclosure: The author’s wife works as an adviser to Scott Walker.
