Republicans were ready for a street fight Thursday night in a compelling, sometimes fierce presidential debate -- main event in the first of the 2016 race -- with front-runner Donald Trump in the center position among a field of 10, going on the offensive from the first question.
Asked by Fox News moderator Brett Baier for a show of candidates' hands who is unwilling to pledge his support to the eventual Republican nominee and pledge not to run as an independent, only Trump raised his hand.
As the audience rumbled, Trump said, “I have to respect the person if it’s not me who wins."
The real-estate-mogul-turned-reality-TV-star then said he hopes to run as a Republican and support the eventual nominee, but he wouldn't say categorically the third-party option is off the table.
“I will not make the pledge at this time,” Trump said.
During the Thursday night debate in Cleveland's Quicken Loans Arena, moderators repeatedly challenged Trump -- for disparaging women and illegal immigrants, for donating to Bill and Hillary Clinton and other Democrats, even for his past support for Candadian-style socialized medicine.
Trump never was apologetic.
He bristled when anchor Megyn Kelly asked if he had the temperament to be president when he has in the past so offended women by calling them “fat pigs” and “slobs.”
Trump replied, “The big problem this country has is being politically correct." With that, the packed arena roared its approval.
But then he went after Kelly -- a move the audience booed: “What I say is what I say, and honestly, Megyn, if you don’t like it I’m sorry ... I’ve been very nice to you, although I could probably maybe not be, based on how you’ve treated me, but I won’t do that.”
Asked to offer proof that illegal immigrants are rapists, Trump boomed, “If it weren’t for me, you wouldn’t even be talking about illegal immigration. This was not a subject that was on anybody's mind until I brought it up at my announcement.”
Trump was unapologetic about the four companies he’s been affiliated with that have filed for bankruptcy protection, the latest in Las Vegas. In fact, he insisted he was well-qualified to handle the nation’s debt.
"I took advantage of the laws, and frankly, so has everyone else in my position. I made a lot of money in Atlantic City and I'm very proud of it. ... The country owes $19 trillion and we need somebody like me to straighten out this mess."
Most of the nine other debaters appeared as if they were trying to avoid a confrontation with Trump. The exception was Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, whose efforts to engage the front-runner head-on were largely ineffective and looked like attempts to gain more camera time for himself.
At one point Trump told him, "You're having a hard time tonight."
Besides Trump and Paul, on the stage were Chris Christie, governor of New Jersey; Florida Sen. Marco Rubio; retired Johns Hopkins neurosurgeon Ben Carson; Scott Walker, governor of Wisconsin; Jeb Bush, former governor of Florida; Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas; Texas Sen. Ted Cruz; and John Kasich, governor of Ohio.
Paul mixed it up with Christie, too. The two got into a shouting match over the government's collection of private phone records.
The moderators threw perhaps the most challenging questions not just at Trump, but at Bush who stood next to him, too. They repeatedly fired away on the issues that have so far tripped up his campaign and forced him to address his political family.
Said Bush, “I’m going to run hard, run with heart, and I’m going to have to earn this,” he said. “Maybe the bar is even higher for me, and that’s fine.”
Bush smiled broadly when asked to address an early flub, when he spent days waffling over whether he would invade Iraq knowing what he knows now.
This time he was prepared. Knowing what he knows now, he said, he wouldn’t have invaded. He said as governor, he called all the families of Floridians who died in the war. “I called every one of them I could find to tell them I was praying for them and caring for them, and it was very hard to do,” he said.
Bush defended his position on immigration, explaining his plan to secure the border. He stood by his support for Common Core education standards but said he has never believed the federal government should impose them on individual states.
Bush denied calling Trump an “ass----” in a conversation with a top donor, as was reported earlier in the day.
Trump called Bush “a true gentleman,” even though he has in the past said he does not respect the former Florida governor. “I have a lot of liking for this man,” Trump said. “But the last several months of his brother’s presidency were a catastrophe ... and gave us President Obama.”
More than once the moderators tried to get Bush and his former protege Rubio to disparage one another, but neither did.
The first question directed at Rubio was about why voters should support him when Bush has a longer history of public service. “This election cannot be a resume competition or else Hillary Clinton will be the next president because she’s been in office and government longer than anyone else running here tonight,” Rubio said. The audience cheered. “This election better be about the future, not the past. … If I’m our nominee, we will be the party of the future.”
The moderators' general consensus after the debate was that candidates who impressed most were --
- Bush and Rubio.
- Gov. Kasich, who was playing with a homefield advantage. Asked to defend his strong support of Medicaid expansion, for which he has been criticized, he said he was doing so as a Christian with a strong faith. He also said he opposes same-sex marriage, but “just because someone doesn’t think the way I do doesn’t mean I can’t care about them." The audience cheered.
- Ben Carson. The retired surgeon who has never run for office and was taking part in his first-ever political debate. Not only did he hold his own, but he made an impressive, even humorous closing speech about his experience as a surgeon, drawing parallels to Washington.
Walker, Huckabee and Cruz, all strong social conservatives, weren’t involved in the evening's most memorable exchanges, but their similar views on same-sex marriage and abortion, including defunding Planned Parenthood, were cheered.
Reach Nancy Smith at nsmith@sunshinestatenews.com or at 228-282-2423. Twitter: @NancyLBSmith
