Hey, guys, ready or not, twenty twenty four is here, and we here at breaking points, are already thinking of ways we can up our game for this critical election.
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What do we have for the people today?
Crystal lots to get into you. So we pulled some really interesting data. I think we'd shout out to our producers and our graphics team for putting this together, showing the shift between the first debate and the second debate, so you can see with your own eyes what impact the first debate had as we think about how much, if any, of an impact this.
Particular debate we'll have.
We've also got all the details for you about who's going to be on the stage, who made it, who didn't make it. There were some people up there that I'd never even heard of. Oh, we've got that details
as well. And also, of course we want to focus on what the former President Trump, who is once again declining to participate in this debate, which I think is a poor decision in terms of democracy, but probably a decent position politically, what he is going to be doing this week instead of joining the other candidates on that debate stage.
So let's to get into that's right. But before we get to that, we always want to be able to offer this. I know a lot of people join us for these debates, and if you are able to to produce these specials, which do cost us quite a bit of money, let's go ahead and put this up there on the screen. We've got a ten percent off our yearly membership at breakingpoints dot com.
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But let's get to who's actually going to be on this damn stage.
All right? Let's put it up there on the screen.
So it's going to look very similar to the first debate. We've got a similar cast of characters. The one person who qualified for the first one and did not qualify for the second one is former Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson Ada. As Trump calls him, he will not be there on the stage. Trump qualified, but of course not going to
be there. Vice President Mike Pence, former New Jersey Governor Chris Christy, North Dakota Governor Doug Burgham, South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, entrepreneur of ak Roamaswami, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, and South Carolina Senator Tim Scott. So again very similar stage. Doug Burgham, I think actually got in kind of under the wire.
I certainly did. I think that that.
Magic he pulled with build pocket constitution last time. People had that in mind when they were responding to the pollsters, and he made it in under the wire. So he will be there last I remember he got in that like he got that basketball injury right before.
Oh that's right, yeah, he brought.
His leg acl tair. I don't remember.
But anyway, as a question mark whether he was going to be able to make it. He did, and apparently he quitted himself well enough to at least make the stage a second time.
That's right.
So in terms of who's gonna be hosting, let's go and put this up on the screen, guys. It's going to be over on the Fox Business Network. It will be co hosted with Univision. Now, in terms of the actual moderators who we will have in place, it is going to be Stuart Varney, the Fox Business anchor, and
Dana Perino alongside Univision's Iliya Calderon. So they said, quote, the network will move away from its efforts to focus largely on business and economic topics as it has in the past, So instead of just solely on the economy, they're going to try and get into several different areas.
They didn't necessarily give us the topic last time.
We can all just pray and hope that they do not once again open with the Richmond North of Richmond.
Song, and what does that song mean to you folks?
In some blatant try and appeal to all of them, Varney says this quote, we are going to go over all the issues and that's what the audience wants. Not just the economy that may be the important cagory, but other subjects involved that are here, including the ongoing strike by auto workers that could be interesting.
Yeah, although I'm very interested to hear what they all have.
As you said, though, Crystal, as you said, President Trump is not going to be there. He's going to be speaking actually to some have said auto workers and other union workers in the state of Michigan. He's in general election mode, so that's kind of the thing overlaying on
all of this. If anything, I'm going to be curious to see the side by side ratings of Fox Business and of the people watching the debate, and then presumably the networks who are going to carry the Trump speech live and whether this time instead of Trump's decision to do an interview with Tucker Carlson that's on the internet, but to actually compete with the debate on linear television with a speech at that exact moment.
Yeah, I'm curious what the coverage of that Trump's speech will actually be because obviously, once again, this is another Fox product, yep. Just as the first debate was a Fox product, this is a Fox Business product, so under the same umbrella, So they don't have a lot of interest in showing the counter programming that's going on here. They really want to, you know, there the tent Pole News event and have them be the only game in town.
Who knows how the other networks are going to cover it, But honestly, the other networks are kind of irrelevant to a Republican primary base.
Good point.
So the fact that Fox is going to probably basically ignore whatever he has to say to workers in Michigan.
But I mean, listen, let's be real.
At this point, Trump is dramatically leading in the polls, and the first debate, including his decision not to attend it, really only served to help him because you had more of a fracturing of the people in the Republican base who were open to a Trump alternative. They fractured even more amongst the different candidates. And so guess what, just like in twenty sixteen, guess who that benefits.
And so that's the issue. I mean, at this.
Point, it's hard to see how anyone, even if you did have a consolidation, could dethrone him in terms of the Republican base. But that's really the only pathway is if you have one clear contender who sort of consolidates everyone all the alternatives less around one contender.
It's still early.
I guess theoretically that could still happen, but thus far the first debate only served to exacerbate the fracturing of the potential. Like want to move on from Trump part of the Republican base, Let's go and look at where everybody stands in the polls overall. So obviously Trump sits at the top fifty seven point three percent. Then we've got DeSantis still holding on to second place at thirteen point five percent. Next down the list, we've got the
veak ROMs on me six point eight percent. Then we have Nikki Haley, who is trying to make a claim for being in that top of the pack. She's moved up to now five point three percent, Mike Pence four point two percent, Tim Scott two point five percent, and Chris Christy two point five percent, and then alone in terms of the debate contenders in the bottom of the barrel. Kind of means sorry, Doug Bargram ato point five percent.
But even more interesting than this, I really wanted to take a look at how things had shifted from the first debate, because there is a real question of let's be real, does this matter at all that I think a lot of people are probably feeling at this point, myself included. There was a little bit of movement after the first debate. Put this up on the screen. This
is a national polling average. Trump has improved his positioning a bit since the first debate, so again that speaks to the fact that this is all only benefiting him. He went from fifty five percent to fifty seven percent. DeSantis kind of holding steady, fallen off a little bit, fell off about a percentage point. National polling, the vacant national polling falling up a little bit, mostly staying the same.
Nicki Haley and this is consistent with the national polling and the state level polling seeing a bit of a surge. She was probably the biggest beneficiary of that first debate, going from three point two to five point three. Mike Pence staying the same. Put the next one up on the screen. We've got pulling from Iowa. Trump again jumping up about five percentage points in the state of Iowa, which is you know, obviously really key. Ron DeSantis losing
ground in Iowa. Nikki Haley surging significantly four point six percent to nine percent, surging a little bit a couple percentage points. Tim Scott, who had a bit of kind of got lost in the crowd, I would say, in the first debate falling off New Hampshire. Very similar picture here, but the last one up on the screen. Trump in New Hampshire more or less stang where he was. Nicky Haley, big jump up here from three point eight percent all
the way up to eleven percent. In terms of the New Hampshire pulling average, Chris Christy gaining a bit, Ronda Santis falling off about three percentage points, and Vivek Ramaswamy also gaining a couple of percentage points. So a little bit of movement here or there. Trump kind of consistently going up, Nicky Haley being the largest beneficiary that seeming to eat into Ron De Santis and Tim Scott in particular.
Nothing that's a game changer.
There is no game changer here, and I think you did a great job of just laying it out. The point is, and one of the reasons why I've come to think about this debate and the subsequent like actual impact is it's all just a race for number two. And when you start to think about who that number two figure is. I originally thought it might be someone like Vivike Ramaswami, but Kyle in our last post debate analysis,
I think had it correct. Anybody who's supporting Viveke or largely who was like really cheering him on in.
That position, they're just gonna support Trump.
Yeah, And so that's why I see Nicki Haley, who is probably the best embodiment of donor class, unreconstructed neo conservatism, unreconstructed Reaganism. If you don't like Trump, and you don't like him on personal and policy grounds, then you should support somebody like Nicki Haley and or Tim Scott. And since she had a better performance than any of those other people, she's gonna coalesce that support. Whereas Desantist is trying to do the same thing that Ramaswamy has done, is.
Effectively the middle way.
Like I'm there on policy, but I'm different on personality.
I'm a little bit more radical.
I don't carry the same baggage, but I still support Trump in all but name.
It's like, well, okay, but then I'm just gonna support Trump. So that's why.
A lot of people like Trump's personality.
A lot of people love Trump personality.
In fact, it's probably the best thing about him if you're a GOP voter, and let's be honest, he's funny. So when you look at those polls, and especially like New Hampshire for example, why would we see a Nikki Haley surgeons there? I'm like, yeah, well, it's because there's a small but not insignificant portion of the Republican Party which doesn't love Trumpian style politics and they don't like trumpe and style policy, so they're going to support Niki.
But the thing is is that the overall numbers is not that high. Every single one of these people could drop out, Crystal, he's still a fifty seven percent. So I really wonder, and you know, we'll actually see in our own ratings too, are people going to care that much about this debate? Because such the last debates. I mean, don't forget this Obama and Hillary they debated, I want to say, eighteen times, like it was a blood sport.
It was a long process.
The original GOP twenty twelve nominee, I want to say, there were at least thirteen fourteen debates. And the reasons why it mattered is people genuinely moved. The Perry, you know, had that moment where he didn't remember which one he wanted to cut. Newt Gingrich Surgeon is almost wins South Carolina. There was all these ups and downs, and people were really paying attention.
This time around.
People kind of had their minds made up. The first debate didn't really change anything. As we showed you, poll after poll after poll, it's really what a race for number five, number four, So there's no excitement, there's no expectation of changing. And when there's no expectation of change with the Trump factor like there was in twenty sixteen, it's just very very you know, it's it's just hard to understate really how little impact that this is likely to have.
And if you're not we could be wrong.
And of course we're going to cover it, and we're going to cover it just like we did the last one, because you never know what's.
Going to happen.
Yeah, there could be an X factor, but going into it, no big expectations for changes given what happened the first time around.
Yeah, I mean it feels like there's no stakes.
Yeah, exactly, know, it.
Just feels like hard to see how anything that happens on that debate stage is really going to shift the dynamics. Now, that doesn't mean because the other dynamic that may argue in favor of it being dynamic and interesting and potentially chaotic and good, you know, good content if nothing else, is the fact that every one of these canids at this point has to be a little desperate, yes, and every one of them is going to have someone in
mind that they're going to be coming for. And that's one of the things I'm actually interested in is like, you know, going into the first debate, I really thought the Knights were going to be out for Ron DeSantis.
But actually at that point, DeSantis's bubble had already been punctured, and so there were very little direct attacks on him in that first debate because it already felt like he'd lost so much momentum, and at that point Vivek Ramaswami seemed like he was gaining a lot of attraction, a lot of momentum.
Now it's a different moment.
It's not really clear who is kind of you know, rising into be to contest for that second place position, to be the alternative. If something happens that opens up a space where Republicans are truly evaluating alternatives. So I am curious who's going to take most of the incoming fire.
You know, it could be since Nikki Ailey benefited quite a bit and it's getting a lot of the donor love at this point and media attention, et cetera, it could be that there is a lot of attention paid to her and a lot of attacks coming her way. It could be that because they just find him really irritating, clearly just do not like him, that Vivey continues to be the center of a lot of these fights, with which he also seems to like welcome, and Relis takes
advantage that, right exactly. It could be that this time around, you know DeSantis, who is clung to that second place position in spite of everything, maybe he comes in for the attacks right now.
So there are some interesting.
Divides that have emerged within the Republican party. One thing that I'm certainly going to be looking for you alluded to earlier, Sager, is where everybody stakes their positions out on the autoworkers.
Yes, that's right, especially with Trump in Detroit at the exact.
Moment exactly, and with you know, Biden, they're speaking for the first time on a picket line, et cetera. And this is this has become a huge news story that really ordinary Americans are paying a lot of attention to.
And while the Republican Party has not changed any of their positions with regards to unions and being sort of anti union and who they stack their national labor relations boards with, et cetera, there's been a real rhetorical shift and in terms of the Republican base, there has been
a massive shift in terms of their views. So that'll be one of the dividing lines on that stage of who is going to at least symbolically offer some sort of support to the workers and who is going to stake out as Tim Scott did you know he said that they should all be fired, and Nikki Haley also made some very anti union, anti worker comments as well, So we know which side they'll be on. Where will
everybody else position themselves. It's less important for who's going to be president, but more important as a barometer of where the sentiment within Republican Party elites are and the pressure they're feeling from their own base to strike a very markedly different tone than they would have you know, back in the Scott Walker era, back in the twenty tens.
Yeah, exactly.
That's a great point, and I think really what comes down to is we need to see where they are on unions. I think there, if I had to guess, Ramaswami will take the anti ESG stands and say he's basically gonna take the.
Trump way anti electric vehicle.
Anti electric vehicle, anti climate, but will support maybe rhetorically workers' wages. DeSantis will probably try to do that middleway as well. Some of the most of them, if I had to guess, will just come out absolutely against the UAW strike, or they'll blame something else, or they'll blame Biden, you know, I mean, because she.
Is animated like he is very anti union. He could strike strike it like Tim Scott type posture.
On this stuff.
There's probably gonna be a lot of discussion about the border. That's very big right now in Republican circles. I want to see some questions about the shutdown, whether that was the other thing. I want to see some questions about Ukraine aid again though it's just and we will treat it with the seriousness it deserves because it is important. We should have these debates, but because Trump is not there,
it just doesn't matter as much. And the first time around there was so much attention to it again with the thought that like, maybe this could change something. But now we have the evidence, barring a major X factor a big change in it, it's difficult to see how this could change the game. Although as I've said, I still believe it's still important and illuminating to make sure that we learn as much as possible from these candidates.
I also would like to see they didn't spend enough time, nearly enough time last time around about very like basic issues like healthcare and others that had dominated some of the original twenty sixteen debates with Trump. Remember when Trump said We're all going to be supported basically like universal health care. We should talk about that again. And I also want to hear some questions about housing. But I'm not going to hold my breath.
I mean, the way that.
These anchors usually just hold these debates is so stupid. At a political level, I expect Nicki Haley, like you said, to be the target for Chris Christie, because Christy is really betting it on New Hampshire. If she's surging, she's actively drawing it away from him. He also doesn't really like her, so that very much could see explosions. In terms of Evek, He's still going to get a huge
amount of pushback, probably just because of Ukraine. I expect him to come forcefully out against any more Ukraine Aan DeSantis again trying to take a middleway, and that could be a fun debate on the stage. But those are the only clashes that I'm trying to predict right now.
Yeah, So let's go and put up on the screen where Trump is going to be this week, since he is like the elephant in the room hanging over all of this. As a CNN ride up, they say Donald Trump will be all across America this week except on the debate stage. He kicked off this week on Monday afternoon with a rally in the early voting state of South Carolina. Plans to follow that with a visit to Michigan on Wednesday, gave a speech before union workers and retirees.
He's scheduled to be in California on Friday, two days after the debate, to speak at the State upe's Fall convention in Anaheim, and on Sunday, Trump will travel to a Tumwa Iowa.
I don't know how sure let's go with that, so Hoole.
To commit to caucus event and deliver policy remarks largely focused on agriculture, according to a source familiar with his plans. And another question for these debates is always, you know, how much of the time do you spend focusing on the guy who isn't there? You know, he is doing this counter scheduling event with workers in Detroit, and the autoworker strike is obviously a big topic of conversation right now and concern in terms of future working people and
the economy and all of those good things. So how much are they using Trump and getting people to react to things that he's saying and things that he's doing, versus just asking questions directly on the stage. How much are we, you know, talking about the indictments that he's facing and what that means for whether or not he can get elected again, or whether or not he's going to end up in prison, and whether they still support him if he is in prison and he's the nominee.
So there's a lot that could be that could be said there as well, which again will illuminate some real divides on that stage about their posture and approach.
To all of this.
Yes, absolutely, so look we'll get to hopefully at least some policy it will give us. These are useful in this way. What does what do things actually look like without Trump? How much have things moved? Where do these candidates fall on some of these issues? How are they going to hand some of the Trump indictment questions? That one's always fun to see the debates between them, the union question as well. Let's try and get some more
kitchen table if we possibly can. Immigration is a big one for a lot of the people who are in the party, especially in the GOP primary base, So those are all going to be fun topics. So yeah, that's my overall prediction. We didn't even bother with winners and losers last or this time around, because we're like, can you really win when Trump is winning so big?
And I think we would both pick like Trump as the big one very likely because and you look at those polls of how things move, like he was the primary beneficiary. DeSantis is still in second, but came down. Trump went up. Everybody splitting that Trump alternative vote, and that's only good for him. So it's hard even there was a write up about how you know, the donors who have been trying to pick a different horse and try to come up with a strategy for someone else
that people could coalesce around. They've also kind of thrown up their hands like, ah, I don't see it happening. There's just too much loyalty to him, too much commitment to him to.
Divide it up a field.
Maybe if you lead from the beginning with one primary alternative, maybe then you would have had a shot. Hard to see how they turn the tide at this point.
Very very difficult to see.
Okay, we will have good postgame analysis for everybody. As we said, maybe something fun will happen.
Sure something some interesting things.
Regardless of whether yeah, look, reather has an impact or not. It's interesting nonetheless, and people should hear from these people. That's what democracy and debates actually are all about. So we'll have all of the breakdowns for the best moments, the winners, the losers, the power panel, all of that on our show that will drop tomorrow on Thursday. Please take advantage of the Debate special discount if you're possible
Breakingpoints dot Com to support our work. Otherwise, we're excited to see you guys tomorrow.