Despite Donald Trump’s dominance, the Republican primary for the 2024 presidential election is very busy. More than a dozen candidates have signed up to start the race for the White House, but many don’t stand a chance. Eight of them exceeded the minimum standards required for voting intentions and donations from supporters to participate in the debate. All but Trump will fight for nearly two hours in a debate aired on Fox News this Wednesday.
The Fiserv Forum Pavilion in downtown, where Giannis Antetokoumpo’s Milwaukee Bucks play, will be the stage on which the dialectic battle will take place. These are the candidates who will participate:
Ron DeSantis, at a campaign event in Newport, New Hampshire last week. BRIAN SNYDER (Portal)
Ron DeSantis
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is Trump’s main rival in the primary, but is a far cry from the former president. At 44, married and a father of three, he appeared to be Republicans’ big promise after his overwhelming success in running for governor in November 2020. But he delayed his entry into the race, his campaign started badly and is getting worse. His first act was a botched Twitter forum with the eccentric Elon Musk, completely marred by technical problems. The Trump campaign fired the negative publicity artillery at DeSantis to keep him from taking off, and thanks to the governor’s missteps, it succeeded.
DeSantis failed to find the tone of the campaign. He’s torn between defending or criticizing Trump over the allegations, while the former president taunts him for changing the way he pronounces his name in the first place. His most recent blunder was to criticize not Trump but his supporters, suggesting they are a herd blindly following their leader. The problem is that he needs the votes of a majority of them if he wants to win the nomination.
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His strategy was to point out that Trump has no chance of winning against Joe Biden due to the resentment he evokes from moderate and independent voters. He labels him a loser from his 2020 defeat and poor 2022 term results, and is presented as a contrast to his broad victory in Florida, a state where Democrats and Republicans were previously tied. However, he is very conservative himself and arouses suspicion among moderate voters. Moreover, his campaign blunders have taken their toll. The gap has widened and even second place in the primaries is in jeopardy. According to the FiveThirtyEight average of major polls, their voting intent is 15.2%, compared to 52.5% for Trump.
In case something was missing to ruin the tone he brings into the debate, The New York Times published his campaign strategy documents, including one with recommendations for the debate: “1. Attack Joe Biden and the media 3-5 times. 2. Present the positive vision of the DRG [gobernador Ron DeSantis] 2-3 times. 3. Defeat Vivek Ramaswamy in a reply. 4. Defending the absent Donald Trump in response to an attack by Chris Christie. Does it stick to the script?
Mike Pence, last week, at a political conference in Atlanta, Georgia. CHENEY ORR (Portal)
Mike Pence
Mike Pence, 64, was a staunch Trump vice president throughout his presidency until the boss asked him to break the law and undermine the election results to prevent Joe Biden’s presidential victory from being confirmed by Congress. At this crucial moment, Pence chose to remain loyal to the Constitution. The Trumpists have not forgiven him.
Pence says his differences with Trump go well beyond what happened the day the Capitol was stormed. He is a traditionally conservative, anti-abortion evangelical whose beliefs are at odds with the former president’s moral relativism.
The former vice president is both a rival of Trump and a witness in one of the cases he is being accused of. He tried to refuse to testify, but in the end he had to, and the prosecutor also had access to the notes he made of his boss’s pressure to annul the elections.
Due to the few contributions from his supporters, Pence struggled to even qualify for the debate. In the Republican primary polls, it is just under 5% in voting intent.
Vivek Ramaswamy, in a file image. EDUARDO MUNOZ (Portal)
Vivek Ramaswamy
It’s the biggest surprise of the Republican primary. Vivek Ramaswamy, 38, son of Indian immigrants, presents himself as a kind of millennial trump, a billionaire businessman, a successful biotechnology investor, a lover of the free market and a scourge of bright ideology, of progressive ideas. about climate change, diversity and the equality he is fighting. He opposes the social responsibility of companies, which he considers perverted by the ideological accusation. And mostly with his slick speeches, his money and his defense of Trump, he gained ground in the polls. According to the FiveThirtyEight average, he’s at 9.2%, well ahead of Pence and close to DeSantis. He doesn’t bite his tongue, so he’s expected to be one of the entertainers of the debate.
Nikki Haley, this month, at a campaign event in Des Moines, Iowa. SCOTT MORGAN (Portal)
Nikki Haley
Trump’s former UN ambassador and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley is among those who firmly believe Republicans should back away from Trumpism, but she is also very cautious in her criticism of the former president. She was one of the first to take this step, and early in her campaign she made a splash by calling for a cognitive ability test for candidates over 75 (read Biden and Trump). The star anchor of CNN’s morning shows said at 51 she was no longer in the prime of her life. Because of this and his small audience, he was eventually fired.
Haley, the only woman of the eight candidates, could not prevail. His poll average is 3.5% among Republican voters. Like Ramaswamy, she is the daughter of Indian immigrants. His original name is Nimarata Nikki Randhawa. She took the middle name and surname of her husband, military man Michael Haley.
Chris Christie, at a political conference in Atlanta, Georgia last week. CHENEY ORR (Portal)
Chris Christie
During the 2016 campaign, Chris Christie, a 60-year-old former New Jersey governor, helped Trump prepare for the debates after leaving his own campaign. Now he will be the most critical voice of the former president in the Fox debate. He has called Trump a “coward” for his absence, but most importantly, he openly questions the former president.
The candidate broke with Trump after refusing to accept defeat in the 2020 election. He believes the former president hijacked the Republican Party because of his megalomania and personal interests. “I’m running because you let us down,” Christie said at a recent political rally held by an influential evangelical group. “He let us down because he is not willing to take responsibility for his mistakes, his shortcomings and his actions. This isn’t leadership. It’s a leadership failure,” he added. This position is not very popular in the party. He was booed and has a 3.5% voting intent.
Tim Scott campaigning in Des Moines, Iowa this month. SCOTT MORGAN (Portal)
Tim Scott
The only black Republican Senator, Tim Scott, 57, enjoys brilliant oratory. He is a deeply religious and conservative candidate who has often quoted the Bible at campaign events and has advocated a federal law banning abortions after the first 15 weeks of pregnancy (in Spain, the time limit law allows abortions in the first 14 weeks). week of pregnancy without further requirement).
A senator from South Carolina, he is the grandson of a worker in the cotton fields of the deep south of the United States. He sells his personal story of success and overcoming – he was raised by a divorced mother who worked long hours as a nurse to support him and his brother – as alleged proof that there is no racism in his country, which those who striving for prosperity prevents . . He only has a voting intention of 3.4%.
Asa Hutchinson, at a campaign event in Des Moines, Iowa last week. SCOTT MORGAN (Portal)
Asa Hutchinson
With Christie, it will be the other voice in the debate most outspokenly critical of Trump. He was the last to qualify for the debate, but has only a 0.7% voting intent. Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, 72, believes nominating Trump would be a huge mistake that would ultimately serve Democrats to win Biden’s re-election.
“Donald Trump is not running for President to make America great again (…) Donald Trump is running to stay out of jail,” he said at a recent campaign rally in Iowa. He was booed again and again.
Doug Burgum campaigning in Des Moines, Iowa this month. EVELYN HOCKSTEIN (Portal)
Doug Burgum
North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum pulled out the checkbook to raise enough funds for the debate. He offered 50,000 $20 gift cards to those who donated a dollar, easily exceeding the required minimum donation of 40,000 donations.
Burgum, a 67-year-old billionaire, won the election to governor of North Dakota, a distinctly Republican state but largely unknown in the rest of the country. His presence in the election campaign is a testimony. On average in the polls, his intention to vote is 0.4%.
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