By the time you read this, the news cycle may have already moved on to anticipating former President Donald Trump’s surrender in Georgia Thursday on charges that he sought to overturn the 2020 election results. And that has been the problem all along for the Republicans challenging him for the 2024 nomination.
Eight candidates took to the debate stage Wednesday night in what might have been the most substantive policy debate that Republicans, who did not have an official national platform in 2020, have engaged in publicly for quite a while. But none of that really mattered given that Trump, offscreen at his club in Bedminster, New Jersey, is the runaway frontrunner in the polls, and the party’s identity has become all but indistinguishable from the former president himself.
[Related: All the candidates onstage for the first GOP debate, explained]
That much was obvious when Fox News host Bret Baier asked the candidates — who signed a loyalty pledge to the eventual GOP nominee as a condition of participating in the debate — to address the “elephant not in the room.” He told them to raise their hand if they would still back Trump as the party’s choice if he is convicted in any of the four separate criminal cases against him.
At first, four candidates raised their hands. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Trump’s former protégé running a distant second, looked around to see what everyone else did before raising his own. Trump’s estranged former Vice President Mike Pence hesitated but followed. Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, whose candidacy is pretty much based on taking down Trump, wagged his finger.
“Here’s the bottom line. Someone’s got to stop normalizing this conduct,” he said. “Whether or not you believe that the criminal charges are right or wrong, the conduct is beneath the office of president of the United States.”
Asked directly at the debate if they’d support Donald Trump if he is convicted of a felony, 6 out of 8…
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