Republican candidates slam Biden, pile on Vivek Ramaswamy in spirited first debate

Eight top Republican presidential candidates faced off Wednesday night in the first debate of the 2024 election cycle — laying out competing approaches to issues facing the country from abortion to crime to aid for Ukraine.

The group was united in blasting President Biden but differed repeatedly on policy in substantive, if occasionally heated, exchanges under five months before the first votes are cast.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was first to speak at the Fox News-hosted event in Milwaukee, Wis., and offered up a double-barreled attack on Biden’s record and his family’s ethics scandals.

“We cannot succeed as a country if you are working hard and you can’t afford groceries, a car or a new home while Hunter Biden can make hundreds of thousands of dollars on lousy paintings,” said DeSantis, 44, polling in second after former President Donald Trump, 77, who skipped the event.

Vivek: biggest bomb thrower and target

Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, 38, who is currently sitting in third place in the RealClearPolitics national polling average behind Trump and DeSantis, got into repeated sparring matches with the other candidates after pitching himself as an outsider.

“Vivek, you recently said a president can’t do everything. Well, I got news for you. Vivek, I’ve been in the hallway. I’ve been in the West Wing. A president of the United States has to confront every crisis facing America,” said former Vice President Mike Pence, 64, who called himself “the most qualified and proven conservative in this race.”

“This isn’t that complicated, guys: Unlock American energy, drill, frack, burn coal, embrace nuclear,” Ramaswamy slapped back, adding, “I’m not sure I exactly understood Mike Pence’s comment.”

“I’ll go slower this time,” Pence replied. “I was a House conservative leader before it was cool … We don’t need to bring in a rookie. We don’t need to bring in someone without experience.”

DeSantis effectively blocked a question from co-moderators Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum moments later when candidates were asked to raise their hands if they believed humans were contributing to climate change.

“One of the reasons our country’s in decline is because of the way the corporate media treats Republicans versus Democrats,” the Florida governor said. “Biden was on the beach while those people [in Maui] were suffering. He was asked about it and he said ‘no comment.’ Are you kidding me?”

“The climate change agenda is a hoax,” added Ramaswamy, before stunning the audience with his claim that “I’m the only person on the stage who hasn’t bought and paid for.”

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The crowd full of supporters for each of the eight candidates loudly booed.

“I’ve had enough already tonight of a guy who sounds like ChatGPT standing here,” thundered Christie before mocking Ramaswamy’s self-deprecating opening statement.

“The last person in one of these debates … who stood in the middle of the stage and said, ‘What’s a skinny guy with an odd last name doing up here?’ was Barack Obama and I’m afraid we’re dealing with the same type of amateur,” Christie said.

Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, 51, interjected by quoting one of her political idols: “This is exactly why Margaret Thatcher said, ‘If you want something said, ask a man. If you want something done, ask a woman.’”

“We need to start telling China and India that they have to lower their emissions,” Haley added before slamming green-energy subsidies as a potential boon to China because of its dominance in electric battery manufacturing.

The former ambassador to the United Nations’ attempt to project an even-keeled demeanor failed during a later clash with Ramaswamy as the two candidates brawled over US aid to Ukraine against Russia’s invasion.

“I find it offensive that we have professional politicians on this stage that will make a pilgrimage to Kyiv, to their pope, [Volodymyr] Zelensky, without doing the same thing for people in Maui,” said Ramaswamy.

“Vivek, if we do the giveaway that you want to give to Putin, to give him his land, it’s not going to be too long before he rolls across a NATO border,” Pence scolded the biotech maven.

As Haley backed up Pence, Vivek jeeringly wished her success in a “future career on the boards of Lockheed and Raytheon” and accused her of being partially responsible for “pointless wars”

“You have no foreign policy experience,” Haley shot back, “and it shows.”

Pence versus Haley on abortion

Meanwhile, Haley and Pence two veterans of the Trump administration, tangled over abortion policy after the only woman on stage asked: “Can’t we all agree that we are not going to put a woman in jail or given the death penalty if she gets an abortion? Let’s treat this like the respectful issue that it is.”

“To be honest with you, Nikki, you’re my friend, but consensus is the opposite of leadership,” responded Pence, a staunch evangelical Christian who referenced his faith repeatedly Wednesday night.

“It’s not a states-only issue. It’s a moral issue,” he said. “Can’t we have a minimum standard in every state in the nation that says when a baby is capable of feeling pain, abortion cannot be allowed? A 15-week ban is an idea whose time has come.”

Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), 57, backed up Pence’s idea, saying a 15-week abortion ban was the “minimum” that should be done.

“We cannot let states like California, New York and Illinois have abortions on demand up until the day of birth,” he said. “That is immoral.”

Trump defenders vs. critics

The candidates also clashed over the 45th president, who faces four criminal cases heading into the election year and will surrender at Atlanta’s Fulton County jail on Thursday and pose for his first mugshot in a RICO case alleging he illegally sought to overturn Biden’s narrow 2020 victory in the Peach State.

“Someone’s got to stop normalizing this conduct,” Christie said as the Fiserv Forum audience jeered. “Whether or not you believe that the criminal charges are right or wrong, the conduct is beneath the office of president of the United States.”

“This is the great thing about America — booing is allowed, but it doesn’t change the truth,” Christie added in response to the heckling.

Ramaswamy jumped on Christie, saying: “Your claim that Donald Trump is motivated by vengeance and grievance would be a lot more credible if your entire campaign wasn’t based on vengeance and grievance against one man.”

“We must end the weaponization of justice in this country,” added Ramaswamy, drawing this dismissive response from the former federal prosecutor: “You make me laugh.”

“I know a lot better than you do,” Christie chided Ramaswamy. “I am not going to bow to anyone when we have a president of the United States who disrespects the Constitution.”

Later, Christie delivered another broadside against the 77-year-old Republican front-runner.

“We have to dispense with the person who said that we need to suspend the Constitution to put forward his political career. Mike Pence said no, and he deserves credit for it,” the former New Jersey governor said.

Christie was also the only candidate to discourse at length on the criminal case against Biden’s oldest surviving son.

“When Hunter Biden fills out a fake application, a false application for a gun [license] and then is facing a 10-year mandatory minimum, which was mandated by legislation sponsored by his father, and then you have a Justice Department that walks away from those charges, we’re telling people that the law doesn’t apply to everybody,” he said. “In a Christie administration, he would go to jail for 10 years.”

Scott also praised Pence for refusing Trump’s demand that he reject Biden electors while presiding over a joint session of Congress on Jan. 6, 2021, before adding, “This DOJ uses their power, uses their authority not just against political opponents, but against conservatives and conservative causes.”

Pence said of Trump, “He asked me to put him over the Constitution and I chose the Constitution.”

Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson slammed Trump as the avatar of a broader crime problem in the country.

“No one likes to see an America with smash-and-grab [robberies] in our inner cities,” he said. “It starts at the top with respect for our justice system, that a former president who’s under indictment has undermined by attacking judges, by attacking prosecutors, by attacking the system and saying he’s aggrieved.”

Trump said he was skipping the debate because of his substantial polling lead.

The RealClearPolitics average shows Trump with 55.4% support from nationwide GOP primary voters — 41.1 points ahead of DeSantis at 14.3%.

In addition to his latest criminal charges in Georgia, Trump faces a federal case in South Florida for allegedly mishandling classified records, another federal case in Washington for attempting to reverse his election defeat and a state case in Manhattan related to 2016 hush money payments.

Milwaukee, the debate’s host city, also is the venue for the Republican convention next July as the party seeks to reclaim the swing state after Biden’s narrow 2020 win. Democrats convene next August in nearby Chicago.

“The path electorally to the White House runs through the Midwest, and Wisconsin, I think, is going to be key to us winning the White House,” RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel said ahead of the debate.

McDaniel said that Trump’s absence gave other candidates “a chance to introduce themselves” to voters.

“I think a lot of people in the country don’t know all of these candidates,” McDaniel told Fox News, adding that Trump skipping the debate would “give them more time on the stage to introduce themselves and talk about their policies.”

North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, arguably the least-well-known candidate on the stage, opted for a folksy approach in introducing himself.

“I’m from a town of 300 people. It’s a big deal to make it on this stage with all these folks,” said Burgum, who gained substantial free coverage earlier in the day by publicly waffling on whether he would attend the debate after suffering an torn Achilles tendon while playing pickup basketball.

“I think I took them a little too literally,” he joked, “when they said go to Milwaukee and break a leg.”