Winners and losers from the first Republican debate

The best. Also, the worst.

(Contenders in the first Republican debate)

The first debate is in the books!

After months of anticipation, eight of the nine top contenders for the Republican presidential nomination took the stage in Milwaukee on Wednesday night and (sort of) had it out.

I watched the whole thing and chatted live with paid subscribers in a private thread on Substack. (It was fun and good and I think we will do it again!)

Below are my thoughts on the best and the worst of the night that was. Enjoy!

WINNERS

• Nikki Haley: The former South Carolina governor needed a break-out performance to kick start her sluggish campaign and she delivered big time on the debate stage. Haley was poised and confident. She didn’t seem eager to fight with her opponents but when the fight came, she was up for it. (She CRUSHED Vivek Ramaswamy on foreign policy — to the delight of the crowd.) To my eye, she was head and shoulders better than the rest of the field. One thing to watch though: On questions of abortion and Donald Trump, Haley gave pitch perfect answers — for a general election. Not sure how her pragmatism will play in this Republican primary field.

• Vivek Ramaswamy: Man, what I wouldn’t do for just a fraction of Vivek’s self confidence! Ramaswamy, amazingly, was the center of this debate; he attacked and was attacked more than anyone else. Ramaswamy looked and sounded totally different than anyone else on the stage — which in a Republican party that hates politicians and elites is likely to accrue to his benefit. I think he came off — especially in the beginning of the debate — more like a used car salesman (or a guy going door to door selling encyclopedias) than he did like a serious presidential candidate. But, Ramaswamy’s goal coming into the debate was simple: Get more Republican to know who he is. It’s hard to imagine that he didn’t succeed on that front. (By the way, it’s also clear that the rest of the field — especially Mike Pence — HATES Ramaswamy.)

• Donald Trump: The former president probably would have liked to be mentioned more — Fox did one 10 minute segment dedicated to him — but every indication from the crowd was that they were with him. Chris Christie’s attempt to skewer Trump was met with resounding boos. Ditto Asa Hutchinson’s criticism of the former president. And Ramaswamy was cheered for offering a full-throated defense of Trump on his four(!) indictments. Plus, a majority of the people on stage said they would still support Trump for president even if he had been convicted of a crime(!). Overall, the debate felt minor — lessened by the lack of Trump on stage. Which is exactly how he wants it.

• Mike Pence: Would it surprise you if I told you that the former vice president got the most speaking time out of any of the candidates on Wednesday night? He did! Pence was also far more forceful than I have ever seen him, repeatedly taking the fight to the other candidates (especially Ramaswamy). And good on Mike for trying to demand that all the other candidates on stage go on record as to whether he did the right thing on January 6. Do I think anything Pence did Wednesday night changes his low standing in the presidential race? Absolutely not. But he showed a feistiness that I, at least, hadn’t seen before.

• Oliver Anthony: A month ago, no one had ever heard of this guy. On Wednesday night, Fox played a looong snippet of his song “Rich Men North of Richmond” and made it the center of the first question of the debate. And, oh yeah, the song is #1 on the Billboard top 100 too. Not a bad run, Oliver.

• Drones: I love a good drone shot. And so too, apparently, does Fox! They used their drones for all sorts of things on Wednesday night including a fly-in from the studio to the debate stage. The shakiness of the camera made me a little sick to my stomach but I loved it anyway!

LOSERS

• Ron DeSantis: Judging from the overall tenor of the post-debate commentary, I think I felt more negatively about DeSantis’ performance than most. For me, it felt deeply formulaic and robotic. There were canned answers taken directly from his stump speech. There were forced stories about people he met on the campaign trail. And there was the weird smile that DeSantis contorted his face into at the end of every answer. Even if you were more favorably inclined to the Florida governor than I was, it’s hard to see a major moment for him in that debate. He often felt shunted to the side — caught, literally, in between the feuding of Pence and Ramaswamy. Expectations going into the debate were that DeSantis, as the poll leader (aside from Trump) would be the focus of attacks from his opponents. Instead they just kind of ignored him, which, in politics, is WAY worse. For a guy struggling to reclaim his footing in the race, I don’t think the debate was what DeSantis needed it to be.

• Tim Scott: Maybe it’s because I had high expectations for Scott coming into the debate that I was so disappointed by his performance. He seemed very nervous at the start and never really seemed to get into the flow of things. I often forgot he was on stage. In a major back and forth over crime in the country, Scott was a no-show — which is weird given how much work he has done on the issue in the Senate. He just seemed, throughout, to be out of his depth — a step or two slow in his answers and in looking for opportunities to inject himself into the conversation. Scott didn’t need the debate as much as some — his poll numbers are on the way up especially in Iowa — but he really didn’t help himself on Wednesday night.

• Live audiences: I’ve railed against this many times before but I am just not a fan of live audiences at these debates. Inevitably, the moderators tell the crowd at the start of the debate to mind their manners and, also inevitably, no one listens. I just think that the booing and the cheering — of which there was a lot on Wednesday — unfairly skews perceptions of who is doing well and who is doing poorly. It also makes the candidates play to the room rather than to the MUCH broader audience watching on TV. Not a fan.

• 9 pm start times: I will admit that by the end of the TWO HOUR long debate, I was flagging. I know they start these things late on the East Coast so that the West Coast viewers can get home from work and all that, but I just hate it. Read this from Tim Carney on the late debate start time. I agree with every word.