2024 hopefuls argued over education, spending and border security.
The second Republican debate of the 2024 presidential primary, taking place at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, has just come to an end.
The affair was more raucous than the first debate, which took place over a month ago. Candidates interrupted one another much more regularly and several — most notably former Vice President Mike Pence and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie — have directly criticized front-runner Donald Trump, who elected not to show up tonight. The two candidates from South Carolina, former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley and Sen. Tim Scott, went after one another for their records on spending, and seemingly everyone who had the chance to take a shot at entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy did so.
Read below for highlights, excerpts and key moments.
DeSantis gets a question on China and says he wants a totally new approach to that country. He says that he wants to ban the Chinese Communist Party from buying land anywhere in America, and also says he doesn't want them in our universities. It wasn't clear if he was talking about all Chinese students, or just the Confucius Institutes he mentioned right after.
—Jacob Rubashkin, 538 contributor
This is accurate. From our colleagues at the Pew Research Center:
“In the nearly five decades that the current system for budgeting and spending tax dollars has been in place, Congress has passed all its required appropriations measures on time only four times: fiscal 1977 (the first full fiscal year under the current system), 1989, 1995 and 1997. And even those last three times, Congress was late in passing the budget blueprint that, in theory at least, precedes the actual spending bills.”
-Analysis by Aaron Sharockman, PolitiFact
In an August poll by YouGov/The Economist, Republicans were particularly likely to be wary of the U.S. relationship with China. Forty-three percent of Republicans said China poses an immediate and serious economic threat to the U.S., while only 16 percent of Democrats and 28 percent of independents agreed. When it comes to a military threat, 33 percent of Republicans said China poses an immediate and serious threat, compared with 13 percent of Democrats and 24 percent of independents.
—Analysis by 538
Likely Republican voters are pretty split on "sending U.S. military forces to Mexico to fight drug cartels," according to our pre-debate 538/Washington Post/Ipsos poll. 44 percent support the proposed policy, compared with 46 percent who oppose.
—Analysis by Holly Fuong of 538
