On D, Haley suffers an L

Her responses to DeSantis were limp, which might take the air out of her rise.

Nikki Haley weathered biting attacks from Ron DeSantis in the fourth Republican presidential primary debate while the trailing pair largely disregarded front-runner Donald Trump, who again ducked a fight with his rivals in order to preserve his extensive lead in the homestretch before 2024 voting commences.

Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy and former Gov. Chris Christie played supporting roles, at times hurling caustic insults at each other and offering vastly different ideological and stylistic paths forward for the Republican Party.

But the instant post-debate analysis was that Haley’s defense isn’t as strong as her offense, and that her explanations on questions of conservative cultural touchstones lacked the assertiveness necessary to assuage conservative skeptics in a MAGAfied party.

“She in relative terms lost tonight,” declared former South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford on NewsNation, the network hosting the event. “And by that DeSantis won.”

Read my full takeaways for McClatchyDC & The Miami Herald

#Stacking my 2023 #GOPDebate coverage here:

Hyper-aggressive Vivek dominates Trump-less debate stage as DeSantis plays it safe

davecatanese

A post shared by @davecatanese

@davecatanese3 #takeaways from the 3rd #GOPDebate in #miami: @Vivek Ramaswamy’s suicide bomb, the relcutance to invoke #DonaldTrump and the next candisate most likely to drop out. More on my #TooCloseToCall Substack. Search: David Catanese on Substack.

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