Who ‘won’ the fifth Republican presidential debate?

A win

“This is about preventing war,” former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley said while extolling the importance of helping Ukraine push back against Russia. Haley used the topic of aid for Ukraine to (again) highlight her foreign policy chops while explaining what she believes are the potential ripple effects of capitulation in eastern Europe. If successful in Ukraine, Haley argued, Russian President Vladimir Putin could very well expand into Poland and the Baltics. These are NATO countries, which would likely draw the U.S. into a broader conflict.

Asked the same question about aid to Ukraine, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis equivocated, claiming that aiding Ukraine would come at the expense of securing the U.S. border. On this question, Haley showed moral clarity, while DeSantis blindly toed the party line drawn by Donald Trump.

A loss

DeSantis was lobbed a softball question on the topic of Trump’s legal troubles — and whiffed. While there are plenty of complicated theories and laws at play, CNN’s moderators went easy on the two candidates Wednesday night, asking only whether they agreed with Team Trump’s latest presidential immunity argument.

Trump’s lawyers claimed in court on Tuesday that a president has immunity from criminal prosecution, even if he (or she) opts to have a political opponent assassinated, unless they have been convicted at a Senate impeachment trial. This should have been an easy answer, even for DeSantis. Of course an American president does not have carte blanche to assassinate a political opponent. This is not just common sense — many legal experts agree. Instead, the Floridian timidly demurred: “I’m not exactly sure what the outer limits are.” It was an uncomfortably cowardly — and cringeworthy — response.

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A lie

Abortion has proved problematic for the GOP candidates this campaign, and a question about reproductive rights once again tripped up Haley. “The Democrats put fear in women on abortion,” Haley said while arguing that the GOP’s goal instead is to “save as many babies as possible and help as many moms as possible.”

That’s a nice talking point, but it blatantly ignores the GOP’s record at both the state and federal levels.

Republicans consistently vote against child care. They vote against universal pre-K. They vote against expanding child tax credits. They vote against SNAP, even though nearly half of SNAP recipients are children. They vote against Medicaid, when, again, around half of recipients are children. When Republicans stripped women of their reproductive rights, we read in horror about young girls forced to give birth after being assaulted. Of the 10 states with the highest child poverty rates, eight voted for Trump in 2016 (and 2020). The facts are clear: Haley and her fellow Republicans are simply lying when they claim to prioritize “helping” children and mothers.