Businessman Vivek Ramaswamy took the most hits among candidates during Wednesday’s first GOP presidential debate.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis was expected to be the lightning rod of attacks from his fellow presidential opponents, but Ramaswamy appeared to take the title.
From former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley to former Vice President Mike Pence, Ramaswamy fielded flak from all sides on the debate stage, and people took notice.
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“Mike Pence has had a strong debate. DeSantis has been strategically hiding while Vivek takes fire from all comers,” National Review executive editor Mark Wright said.
“Christie had a moment early, but has so far failed to land a knockout punch in his biggest opportunity,” he continued. “All of them clearly hate Vivek.”
“An amazing amount of intense attention devoted to Vivek tonight from a bunch of politicians who have been around and known for way longer than he has been,” journalist Glenn Greenwald wrote.
“Internal polling must be showing interesting things beyond Trump’s massive lead,” he continued.
Foreign policy appeared to be a liability for Ramaswamy as he received attacks from multiple candidates.
Haley tore into Ramaswamy over his foreign policy, saying his inexperience “shows” while Pence blasted the businessman on the subject of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie went after Ramaswamy for his initial answer during the debate where he introduced himself as the “skinny guy with an odd last name.”
Christie’s slam came after Ramaswamy’s statement that the “climate change agenda is a hoax.”
“No, hold on, hold on. Enough,” Christie said. “I’ve had enough already tonight of a guy who sounds like Chat GPT.”
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“He stands up here, and the last person in one of these debates, Brett, who stood in the middle of the stage and said, ‘What’s a skinny guy with an odd last name doing up here’ was Barack Obama.”
“And I’m afraid we’re dealing with the same type of amateur tendencies tonight,” Christie added.
The eight candidates met Wednesday night for the first GOP presidential debate of the 2024 cycle.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and tech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy took the one and two spots on the debate stage as former President Trump refused to hop into the conversation.
Additionally, North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum took the debate stage on crutches after tearing his ACL.
Meanwhile, Biden was declared the Democratic nominee by Democratic National Committee senior adviser Cedric Richmond.
