A Republican debate that helped Trump (and Biden) more than anyone on stage

WASHINGTON —  If the goal of a primary debate is to highlight substantive differences among competing candidates, Wednesday night’s first Republican confrontation hit the mark, with striking disagreements on Ukraine, a split on how strongly to push a nationwide abortion ban and contrasting views of climate change.

But was that truly the purpose of the night?

Entering the debate, former President Trump held a huge lead over all other contenders for the nomination, and his erstwhile strongest challenger, Ron DeSantis, was rapidly losing altitude. In theory, all eight of the people on stage shared a common goal of supplanting Trump.

Instead, they mostly tried to pretend that his absence from the debate equaled absence from the campaign. For nearly all the first hour of the two-hour debate, they largely ignored him.

But, of course, Trump isn’t absent from the campaign; he’s dominating it. His hold on the party was on vivid display when Fox News anchors Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum, the debate moderators, forced the candidates to focus on him by asking for a show of hands on whether they would support Trump against President Biden even if he’s convicted of a crime: All but former Govs. Chris Christie of New Jersey and Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas raised their hands to clearly indicate they would.

The decision by most of the candidates to avoid confronting Trump meant the night largely ended as it began, with the former president still the heavy favorite. His rivals will have a few more opportunities to dislodge him from that perch — should they choose to try — but subsequent debates likely will have smaller audiences than the 14.2 million that AdImpact, a political data firm, estimated watched on Wednesday.

A good night for Haley, not so much for DeSantis

For a couple of the candidates, Wednesday night was a particular missed opportunity.

About a week before the debate, the super PAC allied with DeSantis placed extensive advice for the Florida governor on an obscure internet site. The move was a brazen extension of a common practice that super PACs often employ to get around the law that bars them from directly coordinating with campaigns. The law exists because super PACs don’t have to abide by the fundraising limits that campaigns face; the ways they have found to get around that law have made it hollow.

This time, however, the stratagem backfired. Someone tipped off the New York Times, which quickly publicized the collection of memos and polls, further embarrassing DeSantis’ already embattled campaign. DeSantis insisted to reporters that he had never read the advice; as the debate unfolded, he seemed to go to great lengths to do the opposite of what he had been instructed.

The super PAC had said he should “hammer Vivek Ramaswamy”; DeSantis all but ignored him. The PAC said he should defend Trump from attacks by Christie; DeSantis didn’t.

What he also didn’t do was establish himself as a dominant presence.

Numbers illustrate his fade: DeSantis had the fourth-most speaking time among the eight candidates, significantly less than either Ramaswamy or former Vice President Mike Pence, who engaged each other frequently. When he did speak, he waffled on some major questions, including whether he supported a national abortion ban. The other candidates largely ignored DeSantis. And while that allowed him to tout his Florida record, he had few memorable moments.

The reviews from political professionals were rough.

“DeSantis is done,” said Republican strategist Alex Conant, a former top aide to Florida Sen. Marco Rubio.

The candidate at the center of the most action was Ramaswamy, who labeled climate change a “hoax,” called U.S. support for Ukraine “disastrous” and pronounced Trump the “greatest president of the 21st century.” He drew repeated attacks from Pence, Christie and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, who by turns called him a “rookie,” labeled him “a guy who sounds like ChatGPT” and said he was “totally lacking in foreign policy experience.”

In one memorable exchange, Haley accused Ramaswamy of “choosing a murderer” — Russia’s Vladimir Putin — “over a pro-American country.” The charge caused Ramaswamy to briefly drop the broad smile he kept through most of the night.

For a 38-year-old millionaire entrepreneur with no political experience, the debate attention was no doubt a heady sensation. But it — and he — remain a sideshow.

Ramaswamy has risen in recent polls. He’ll probably surge further in coming weeks based on the name recognition he gained from the debate. Typically, such surge candidates lose ground once voters learn more about them. In any case, Ramaswamy’s die-hard support for Trump leaves him no room to actually challenge the front-runner. And if Trump suddenly became unavailable, Republican voters — a group that is mostly older, white, evangelical Christian and often suspicious of immigrants — almost surely will not turn to an untested neophyte with Hindu faith and an unfamiliar last name.

Haley’s gains might be more lasting. She was the only candidate to achieve a major boost in the share of Republicans considering voting for them, according to a before-and-after set of polls conducted by the Washington Post, Ipsos and FiveThirtyEight.

As her exchanges with Ramaswamy showed, Haley demonstrated that she can punch and did so to much greater effect than her fellow South Carolinian, Sen. Tim Scott, who disappeared even more than DeSantis.

Haley was also one of the few candidates to make a forceful argument for why Republicans should choose someone other than Trump, pointing out that he bears a large share of responsibility for the current huge U.S. public debt and saying that “we have to face the fact that Trump is the most disliked politician in America. We can’t win a general election that way.”

She won favorable reviews for her performance, which in addition to her strong defense of U.S. aid to Ukraine also included a slightly nuanced position on abortion — she called on people to stop “demonizing” the issue and said that while she opposes abortion, Republican politicians have to be “honest with the American people” that they don’t have the votes in the Senate to pass a nationwide ban.

Among the roughly 1 in 4 Republican voters who oppose Trump, the former South Carolina governor and U.N. ambassador probably helped herself significantly. She’s far more popular than Christie, the other major contender for that bloc.

But then there’s everyone else. Each of Haley’s major positions puts her in the minority among Republicans.

Take her argument that Trump is a loser: Most Republicans reject it. A CBS News poll released before the debate found that 61% of Republicans said Trump would “definitely” beat Biden in a 2024 rematch. Only 14% said so about Haley. A majority of Republicans also oppose further spending to aid Ukraine. And in many states, including Iowa, which will kick off the GOP contest on Jan. 15, a majority of Republican primary and caucus voters support a nationwide abortion ban.

That points to another significant winner from Wednesday night — Biden. The president and his aides have made clear their desire to once again run against Trump, even if a large majority of Americans dread a rematch. So long as Trump remains the Republican favorite, Democrats can avoid the harder task of running an 80-year-old incumbent against a younger, fresher opponent.

And regardless of whom the Republicans nominate, Democrats hope to highlight issues on which the GOP is out of step with most voters, none more so than abortion.

On Wednesday, pollsters from GBAO Strategies and Navigator Research, two Democratic firms, equipped a group of 33 undecided voters — independents and soft partisans — with dial meters as they watched the debate. Results from such groups aren’t a scientific poll and have to be taken with some caution, but they can provide useful insights, especially when the reactions are strong. These were.

Each time the candidates talked about the party’s position on abortion, the meter ratings plummeted.

Full coverage of the debate

Missed the debate? Need a refresher? Here’s a rundown of our full coverage:

News Analysis: Some clear losers in first GOP debate, but the absent Trump emerges largely unscathed

Like a chorus line awaiting its leading man, eight Republican presidential hopefuls opened their first debate Wednesday night without the party’s main attraction, hoping to show they can solve a puzzle that has bewildered GOP politicians for eight years: how to get past Trump, Seema Mehta and I wrote.

Five takeaways from the GOP debate: DeSantis’ not-so-big night, Trump’s absence

Noah Bierman looked at some big takeaways from the debate.

Trump tries to undercut GOP debate with Tucker Carlson interview on eve of his Georgia surrender

Former President Trump called the four criminal indictments he’s facing “trivia, nonsense, bulls—,” during an interview with conservative commentator Tucker Carlson that was released just before the Fox News GOP primary debate Wednesday, Sarah Wire wrote.

GOP debate: Is climate change real? Only one candidate raised their hand.

The question posed to the eight Republican candidates on Milwaukee’s debate stage Wednesday night was simple: Raise your hand if you believe human behavior is causing climate change. Faith Pinho looked at how the candidates answered, or ducked.

Who is Vivek Ramaswamy and why did so many of his GOP presidential rivals attack him?

A wealthy millennial entrepreneur who has never run for political office, Ramaswamy was the target of a barrage of attacks during Wednesday’s first debate for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. It was an outsized amount of attention and vitriol from veteran Republican elected officials to devote to a political novice who is an unknown to most voters, Mehta wrote.

Column: Reagan and Robert F. Kennedy did it. Will Newsom and DeSantis?

They were two men seemingly destined for bigger, better things and, perhaps eventually, a head-to-head race for the White House. One was California’s governor, who very much wanted to run for president. The trouble was his party already had its leader — a political veteran who was the strong favorite to top the ticket. The other was a big-state political celebrity whose path to the Oval Office also appeared blocked by his party’s well-established front-runner. And so, with evidently little to lose, Ronald Reagan and Robert F. Kennedy agreed to debate. It was May 1967 and if the circumstances echo today’s prospective throwdown between Gavin Newsom and DeSantis, it just goes to show there really is very little new beneath the sun, Mark Barabak writes in his column.

The latest from court

Rudolph Giuliani, Sidney Powell surrender to Fulton County jail in Trump election case

Former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani surrendered at a Fulton County, Ga., jail Wednesday following an indictment handed down last week in connection with attempts to overturn the 2020 election. Giuliani’s legal team met with staff from Dist. Atty. Fani Willis’ office Wednesday afternoon to negotiate a $150,000 bond before he surrendered at the Fulton County jail, Wire reported.

Trump surrenders to law enforcement in Fulton County 2020 election case

Trump surrendered to authorities in Georgia on Thursday night after being indicted last week and accused of conspiring with allies to overturn the 2020 election that he lost to Joe Biden. His bond, set by a judge and made public Monday, was set at $200,000, Wire reported.

The latest from Washington

California homelessness in spotlight as Supreme Court is urged to consider the right to camp

The Supreme Court is being urged to consider whether homeless people have a constitutional right to sleep on public sidewalks and camp in parks. City officials in California say they face a crisis of homeless encampments that has been made worse by the courts. At issue is a 9th Circuit Court ruling that invoked the 8th Amendment’s ban on “cruel and unusual punishments” to prohibit West Coast cities from making it a crime to sleep or camp on public property, David Savage writes.

The latest from California

Biden is vacationing at a Lake Tahoe home. For locals, he’s another tourist tearing them apart

Strolling on the Lake of the Sky Trail, U.S. Forest Service officer Daniel Cressy marveled at the wildlife that first attracted him to Lake Tahoe. A bald eagle nestled into the top of a Jeffrey Pine looking out over the shimmering blue of North America’s largest alpine lake, and rising in the distance was Mount Tallac, a 9,739-foot peak that he’s skied many times. Then, along the path, Cressy spotted a tree with “J&B” carved into its trunk. “Folks feel like they got to leave their mark, whether that’s scratching on a tree or painting on a facility or leaving trash, ” Cressy said. That small stain of civilization epitomized the growing tension between the millions of tourists who provide economic sustenance to the High Sierra paradise and the effort to preserve the natural splendor that draws them, a clash that came into sharp focus this week with a weeklong visit from world’s most powerful tourist, Biden, Benjamin Oreskes wrote.

As Hollywood strikes drag on, California lawmakers consider unemployment pay for striking workers

California lawmakers are resurrecting legislation that would allow workers on strike to collect unemployment benefits, reigniting a familiar political battle between labor unions and businesses. Under Senate Bill 799, striking workers would be eligible to collect unemployment benefits after they’re on strike for two weeks, an early version of the bill released on Tuesday shows, Queenie Wong reported.

L.A. City Council signs off on police raises amid warnings of financial risk

The Los Angeles City Council on Wednesday approved a four-year package of raises and bonuses for rank-and-file police officers over the objections of critics who said the deal is too expensive and will put the city’s money toward the wrong things, David Zahniser reported.

Column: What we’ll really get from paying nearly $1 billion more for a new LAPD union contract

What’s missing in this rush to spend roughly $1 billion more over four years to “keep our city safe” is that, for the most part, our city is already getting safer. Crime, believe it or not, is on the decline when compared with last year — and it remains nowhere near historical highs, Erika Smith writes in her column.

Sign up for our California Politics newsletter to get the best of The Times’ state politics reporting.