Even in boycotting a debate with his Republican rivals,
front-runner Donald Trump managed to upstage the event on Thursday with a
typical dramatic flourish.
Instead
of attending a seventh debate, the former reality TV star held a competing
event across town that he said raised $6 million for U.S. military veterans. In
doing so, he cast a shadow over his rivals, who frequently tossed barbs his
way.
Trump's
gamble that he could leave the battlefield to his rivals for one night appeared
to pay off, with just days to go before Iowa holds the first nominating contest
of the 2016 election season. No one appeared to emerge as a central challenger
to him during the two-hour face-off in Des Moines.
Trump's refusal to participate in the
debate out of anger that Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly was a moderator prompted a
flurry of last-minute phone calls with Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes that
failed to resolve their dispute.
A Fox News (FOXA.O) statement said Trump requested
that Fox contribute $5 million to his charities in exchange for his attendance,
which the network turned down.
The debate was the type of event
Republicans would routinely have without the flamboyant Trump on stage, and it
lacked the electricity that he brings to the party's search for a nominee for
the Nov. 8 election.
Without Trump on stage, former Florida
Governor Jeb Bush and
New Jersey Governor Chris Christie found themselves
with more room to make their case to voters seeking a more mainstream
candidate.
Both men have an eye on the Feb. 9
first-in-the-nation primary in New Hampshire, which comes on the heels of the
Iowa caucuses on Monday and where an establishment Republican like them might
have a better chance of standing out.
Senator Ted Cruz from Texas and Senator
Marco Rubio from Florida, the two top challengers to Trump in Iowa, engaged in
squabbles over immigration and national security and did not appear to threaten
Trump's lead. He holds the edge over Cruz in polls of Iowa Republicans.
Trump's rivals mocked his decision to sit
out the debate and found ways to criticize him.
"I’m a maniac and everyone on this
stage is stupid, fat and ugly, and Ben, you're a terrible surgeon," Cruz
told his rivals, including Ben Carson, a retired neurosurgeon, as the debate
opened. His next sentence began: "Now that we’ve gotten the Donald Trump
portion out of the way."
Bush, who has been a frequent target of
Trump's attacks, turned a question about religious tolerance into an attack on
Trump's proposed temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States.
"Donald Trump, for example — I
mentioned his name again if anybody was missing him — Mr. Trump believed in
reaction to people’s fears that we should ban all Muslims. Well, that creates
an environment that’s toxic in our own country," Bush said.
Cruz, after a series of questions, said:
"If you ask me one more mean question, I may have to leave the
stage."
In a swipe at both Trump and Cruz, Rubio
chimed in: "Don't worry, I'm not going to leave the stage no matter what
you ask me."
SOCIAL
MEDIA FAVORITE
With his veterans' event drawing live TV
news coverage on Fox News competitors CNN and MSNBC, Trump absorbed plenty of
media attention.
He clung to his insistence that Fox News
had treated him badly. He has complained that Kelly insulted him at a debate in
August and that a statement from the network earlier this week had belittled
him.
Two other Republican candidates, Rick
Santorum and Mike Huckabee, joined Trump on stage after participating in a debate
of low-polling candidates.
Not so former Virginia Governor Jim
Gilmore.
"I’m not about to go across town
tonight to carry the coat for some billionaire," he said at the
"undercard" debate.
There was some mystery as to which
veterans' groups would receive the money raised at the event, which included $1
million from Trump himself. His campaign did not say which group was getting
the funds.
Trump, with just one day's notice on a
weeknight, was able to fill to capacity a hall at Drake University that holds
700.
"I didn’t want to be here, to be
honest, I wanted to be about five minutes away" at the debate, Trump told
the crowd. "When you’re treated badly, you have to stick up for your
rights - whether we like it or not."
Trump dominated social media during the
debate, leading the entire Republican pack in Twitter mentions throughout the
first half of the debate, according to data from social media analytics firm
Zoomph.
Trump was by far the most-searched-for
candidate on Google during the first half of the debate, at one point outpacing
the second-most-searched-for candidate, Rubio, by nearly four-to-one, according
to Google Trends data.
Trump's support in opinion polls, much of
it from blue-collar men, has not wavered for months despite him insulting
Mexican immigrants and Muslims and clashing with Republican establishment
figures like Senator John McCain. (REUTERS)
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