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Previewing the Fourth Set of Republican Debates

Having fewer candidates on stage can only improve things.
red mics debate

Fox Business will be hosting the next two Republican debates tonight at 6:00 7:00 and 9:00 Eastern. The early debate will now include Christie, Santorum, Huckabee, and Jindal, while Lindsey Graham and George Pataki have been cast out of the proceedings all together on account of their non-existent support. The main debate has finally been pared down to a more manageable cast of eight. Trump and Carson remain the field’s leaders with Cruz and Rubio trailing well behind them. Fiorina remains in the main event despite having faded back into obscurity since the second debate. Bush, Kasich, and Paul all need to have successful outings if they are to revive their campaigns, and the most pressure will be on Bush to put in at least a competent performance after his last two underwhelming showings.

The debate will ostensibly be on the economy again, but it’s anyone’s guess how much of the debate will actually be spent covering the candidates’ policy views. I thought the last debate would bring up disagreements on trade and the TPP, and the subject never came up. If it does, it could offer the audience a real clash on the merits of trade agreements, but there aren’t many candidates that will want to identify themselves with a trade deal endorsed by Obama and so they might try to blur their differences with each other on this. Immigration will very likely be a larger part of the debate, especially since Trump and Cruz have recently been laying into Rubio over his support for the Gang of Eight immigration bill. Rubio has managed to get through the past three debates without facing a significant, policy-related attack, so it remains to be seen how well he can fend off attacks from the two biggest demagogues in the field. Bush might have an opportunity to ding Rubio on his opportunism on this issue, but he has already shown he has neither the appetite nor the ability to launch attacks on his rivals. Having fewer candidates on stage can only improve things, and it could make for some livelier exchanges between them, and it should also make it more difficult for any of them to avoid scrutiny.

I don’t expect foreign policy to come up much tonight. If there are any foreign policy questions, I assume they will be overwhelmingly focused on Syria, Russian involvement there, and the war on ISIS. That could give Paul a chance to distinguish himself from the others and reuse his line likening Rubio’s foreign policy views to Clinton’s. If the CNBC debate is any indication of the topics we can expect to hear about, though, foreign policy will probably receive very short shrift. We are more likely going to end up listening to round after round of questions about Carson’s biographical claims, Rubio’s credit cards, and other trivial things of that sort. In spite of that, I’ll be covering both debates on Twitter (@DanielLarison) and will probably have more to say about them tonight or early tomorrow.

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