Last night, seven Republican presidential candidates gathered at the Iowa Events Center in Des Moines for their last debate before the Iowa Caucuses.
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Because Donald Trump, of course.
The site states that “100% of your donations will go directly to Veterans needs” but also includes a disclosure at the bottom of its single page that funds go to the Donald J. Trump Foundation.
“I’m a manic and everyone on this stage is stupid, fat, and ugly, and Ben, you’re a awful surgeon”, Ted Cruz said.
The joke drew a mixed response from the audience.
The debate was the type of event Republicans would routinely have without the flamboyant Trump on stage, and it lacked the electricity that he brings to the party’s search for a nominee for the November 8 election. That, too, seemed to elicit catcalls as well as applause.
The decision came amid a feud with Fox News after Trump questioned whether moderator Megyn Kelly would treat him fairly at the debate.
Marco Rubio said the 2016 presidential campaign is “not about Donald Trump”. After a sarcastic statement from Fox, saying that it had information that Iran’s and Russia’s leaders were going to treat him unfairly, Trump bolted.
Trump said he delayed his rally 15 minutes to give viewers a chance to switch over from the debate.
The candidates largely sidestepped direct confrontations with each other, focusing some of their most pointed attacks on Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton. He has done so while spending a fraction what his deep-pocketed intraparty opponents have spent.
Speaking before the event, Fisher House Chief of Staff Mary Considine said she doubted her group would work with Trump.
Cruz argued in the debate that his amendment was a poison pill created to kill the entire bill.
Rubio came in looking to dominate by asserting himself more often, sticking to national security as much as possible, and pushing back hard on any criticism that came his way.
Senior Republicans, such as Mitch McConnell and John McCain, have given Trump a new legitimacy in Washington by supporting his attacks on his rival’s eligibility to be president as a natural-born citizen – given Cruz’s birth in Canada.
Rubio had sharp words for Cruz. They got questions they hadn’t gotten before – Bush about Puerto Rico’s shaky finances, for example, and Rubio about cap-and-trade for carbon emissions – and engaged in lengthy exchanges about issues like immigration reform.
Thom, who raises Alaskan Malamute and Pomalute puppies in Minnesota, and plans to spend Monday in Iowa volunteering for Trump, dismissed Cruz as “a Canadian born citizen” and described the Texas senator, as well as the other GOP contenders as “weak”. “Marco Rubio’s different, the Republican Obama who championed Obama’s amnesty and led the Gang of Eight”, a reference to failed immigration legislation in 2013 that would have provided a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. “You are going to show, as am I, that real leadership matters, that strong leadership matters and that the people of Iowa know how to pick a strong leader”.
Both men essentially denied the videos’ implicit accusation of political hypocrisy.
“I want to say how grateful I am to Donald Trump for inviting us here, because the easy thing for him to do is to simply ignore that anybody else cares about veterans, and he’s not that kind of person”, Huckabee said, thanking the frontrunner for the invitation.
Midway through the event Thursday, Trump called former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and former Pennsylvania Sen.
“He cut and ran because it wasn’t popular with conservatives”, Bush said. He spoke concisely, confidently and occasionally argumentatively, a sharp reversal of his performances in earlier debates when he appeared listless and backed away from conflict, particularly with Trump.
Also clearly invigorated was Kentucky Sen.
Cruz also defended his conservative credentials on immigration.
Then the goal will be to get his supporters to Monday’s caucuses, concentrating on evangelicals, who in recent elections have made up more than half of caucus voters and who Cruz has said from the start are the key to victory.
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Republican presidential candidates, from left, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Sen. That means a barnstorming weekend that will see Cruz visit the last two of Iowa’s 99 counties that he hadn’t visited already – a feat that’s intended to show his commitment to the state.
