The debate held on Fox Business Network was the first debate that took care of nearly every aspect of the governance and many major issues that couldn’t gain their attention in previous debates. Chief among them: immigration. “It will tear families apart”. “And even having this conversation sends a powerful signal – they’re doing high-fives in the Clinton campaign right now when they hear this”. Ted Cruz of Texas, former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina and U.S. Sen.
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“The Democrats are laughing – because if Republicans join Democrats as the party of amnesty, we will lose”, Cruz said. “But we have no choice if we’re going to run our country properly and if we’re going to be a country”. “If you raise the minimum wage, it distorts the free market and leads to a surplus of people looking for jobs”, Thompson said.
Marco Rubio: He had another solid debate performance, giving memorable soundbites (“We need more welders and less philosophers”) and flexing his hawkish muscles on foreign policy.
Republican presidential candidates shake hands following the Republican Presidential Debate hosted by Fox Business and The Wall Street Journal. But they were more polite and laissez faire than their CNBC counterparts.
A few times Bartiromo had to press candidates to answer questions they blew past in order to launch into crowd-pleasing speeches.
Kyle Kondik, managing editor of the newsletter Sabato’s Crystal Ball at the University of Virginia Center for Politics, said the debate winners and losers weren’t clear. Marco Rubio of Florida, businessman Donald Trump, Dr. Ben Carson, U.S. Sen. When pressed on how he could carry out the deportation of millions, Trump said youre going to have a deportation force, and youre going to do it humanely.Rubio said the government must deal with those here illegally responsibly but realistically. He said those applying to remain legally would have to pass a criminal background check, pay a fine and learn English, among other requirements.
Rubio and Cruz reinforced their claim to be the most natural debaters on the stage. This was the best performance by Jeb Bush in all the four GOP debates thus far.
While pieces of Carson’s background had been challenged earlier in the campaign, the questions ballooned last week after CNN reported it could not find friends or confidants to corroborate the story, told in his widely read autobiography, of his unsuccessfully trying to stab a close friend when he was a teenager.
“I have no problem with being vetted”, Carson said.
(Kasich) “Come on folks, we all know you can’t pick them up and ship them back across the border, it’s a silly argument”.
While Republicans are largely in sync on cutting taxes, the candidates want to change the tax code in very different ways.
On taxes, all candidates apparently agreed that fixing the economy was the primary goal of any administration – and the plan for this was invariably tax cuts.
Full expensing of capital investment is another area where the Republican candidates agree.
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Johnson has not endorsed anyone.
