5 takeaways from the DeSantis-Haley debate in Iowa

DES MOINES, Iowa — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley took to the debate stage here Wednesday, less than a week before Iowa caucusgoers will select their chosen candidate in the GOP primary.

The debate’s tone was immediately negative, with Haley and DeSantis lobbing attacks at each other from the start. DeSantis sought to paint Haley as a “corporatist” Republican beholden to donors, while Haley accused DeSantis of lying and repeatedly plugged her campaign’s attack website against him.

But while Haley and DeSantis were on the CNN debate stage at Drake University, their chief rival, former President Trump, was taking part in a town hall with Fox News. The Hill/Decision Desk HQ average shows Trump leading DeSantis and Haley by 35 points in Iowa, less than a week out from the state’s Republican caucuses. It’s unclear whether the forum will ultimately have any major impact on the caucus next week.  

Here are five takeaways from the debate:  

Candidates go negative 

DeSantis and Haley were lobbing attacks at each other within minutes of the debate starting.

In his opening remarks, DeSantis referred to Haley as a “mealy-mouthed politician.” Haley jokingly warned Drake University students in her remarks to not turn the debate into a drinking game every time DeSantis lies, because “you will be overserved.” Haley also went on the offense against DeSantis’s campaign, saying the governor mishandled the operation.  

The two candidates swiped at each other over issues as well. DeSantis said Haley was “confused” on abortion, arguing that “she’s trying to speak to different groups with different things.” Meanwhile, Haley called DeSantis out for saying he would “never raise” the retirement age for the public to receive social security.

But Haley and DeSantis did not limit their attacks to each other; they also aimed their fire at President Biden and his administration. DeSantis accused Biden of hanging U.S. troops in the Middle East ‘out to dry,’ while Haley called Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s failure to communicate with Biden about his health status “unforgivable.”  

Still, the picture of Haley and DeSantis duking it out on the debate stage as Trump participates in a solo town hall down the road could paint a picture of Trump’s GOP challengers cannibalizing themselves ahead of the first presidential primary contest.  

DeSantis has one of his strongest showings 

DeSantis gave one of his strongest performances on the debate stage yet as he targeted Haley on both her record and on issues such as education and abortion. 

“I think she’s been confused on the issue,” DeSantis said when asked if Haley was “sufficiently pro-life.” 

“I think she’s trying to speak to different groups with different things, but when she says things like ‘pro-lifers need to stop talking about throwing women in jail,’ that’s a trope. No one I’ve ever met thinks that that’s something that’s appropriate.” 

Haley has argued federal restrictions on abortion are not realistic, given that the Senate doesn’t have the 60 votes needed to pass anti-abortion legislation and that they needed to reach a “consensus” on the issue. 

“Consensus on the fact that, let’s encourage more adoptions that are good quality adoptions, consensus on the fact that we should have contraception — that contraception should be available and consensus that no state law should put a woman in jail or give her the death penalty for having an abortion,” Haley said in July.

Meanwhile, DeSantis has said he would back a 15-week limit at the national level. DeSantis also argued that Haley “caves” under pressure and is insufficiently conservative. 

“I think the difference between Nikki Haley and me, you know, I listened to all that litany of stuff — you know, I debated the governor of California, Gavin Newsom. You know, I thought he lied a lot. Man, Nikki Haley … gives him a run for his money, and she may even be more liberal than Gavin Newsom is,” he said. “We are in a situation here in Florida, and as Republicans, you need somebody that is gonna be in there and fight for you. And Nikki Haley, anytime the going gets tough, anytime people come down, she caves.” 

He also received applause from the audience when he contrasted himself with Haley, arguing, “We don’t need an accountant in the White House, we need a leader in the White House.” 

Haley on defense 

Haley offered a mixed performance Wednesday, at times clearly getting under DeSantis’s skin while also finding herself on the defense. Multiple times she pointed to a website, desantislies.com, which she argued set her record straight on the issues. 

When DeSantis targeted over her efforts to raise the gas tax as South Carolina governor, Haley retorted, “First of all, bless his heart. Desantislies.com. We have never raised a tax.” 

“I can tell you that we killed the gas tax multiple times. But what we said is if you want to raise the gas tax, you have to reduce the income tax by five times that amount. They didn’t want to do it. We’ve killed taxes every step of the way,” she said, after the two got into a brief back-and-forth. 

Haley in 2015 said cuts to state income tax needed to be coupled with a gas tax increase. A hike in the gas tax ultimately didn’t happen while Haley was governor, according to The Associated Press.

DeSantis also hit Haley over her support of Ukraine.  

“I supported Trump’s policy vis-à-vis Russia-Ukraine, and it was successful. You know, the Biden policy has not been,” he said. “But, Nikki Haley is basically a carbon copy of what Biden is. It’s an open-ended commitment. They want another $108 billion. They will not tell you when the — they have achieved their goal. And this is gonna go on maybe hundreds of billions more into the future.” 

But Haley also got in a few retorts of her own, targeting DeSantis over a campaign that has been backsliding and has a high cash burn rate. 

“The best way to tell about a candidate is to see how they run their campaign,” Haley said.

“He has blown through $150 million,” she added. “I don’t even know how you do that.”

Trump escapes unscathed (again) 

The former president, who is the GOP front-runner, skipped his fifth straight debate in the 2024 race, leaving the stage to the two candidates vying to take him on. But Trump’s name came up on multiple occasions throughout the night, more so than in at least some other debates, in part because of the moderators’ questions. 

Co-moderators Jake Tapper and Dana Bash asked Haley and DeSantis a few questions related to Trump, including in reference to comments he has made calling for the “termination” of the rules in the Constitution over his false claims of voter fraud costing him the 2020 presidential election. They also asked why they are better choices for the Republican nomination than he is. 

Haley on a few occasions attacked the “chaos” around Trump, as she has before, and called for a “new generational leader.” She also slammed Trump for his legal team’s argument that he should have total presidential immunity protecting him from his criminal cases and called on him to be on the debate stage, because “he’s the one that I’m running against.” 

DeSantis attacked Trump for not following through on campaign promises he made in 2016, such as making Mexico pay for a border wall on the U.S. southern border and draining the swamp. He also accused Trump of running just on “his issues” rather than the country’s.

But both candidates overall spent more time attacking each other than the front-runner in what will be the last debate before the first votes of the election. They repeatedly took swipes at each other and accused the other of lying about their own and each other’s record. 

Overall, while DeSantis and Haley seemed to continue stepping up their attacks on Trump that they began last week at town halls that CNN hosted in Iowa, neither engaged in an all-out offensive against him. 

Unlikely to move the needle 

The ratings for Wednesday’s debate will not be available immediately, so it’s unclear how many people in Iowa and across the country actually tuned into the debate. The competing Fox News town hall with Trump could have taken viewers away from the CNN debate as well.  

It’s also unclear how many Iowans have their minds decided ahead of Monday’s caucuses, but polls suggest Trump is in a better place than either DeSantis or Haley. And it seems doubtful the CNN debate will be enough to change the ultimate trajectory of the caucus.

Trump is the runaway front-runner in state and national polls. While Iowa has been known for last-minute surprises in the past, there has never been a former president or incumbent with this large of a lead in the Iowa caucuses. According to The Hill/Decision Desk HQ average, Trump leads with 53.8 percent support, followed by Haley with 18.3 percent and DeSantis at 17.4. 

If Haley and DeSantis are unable to come in a close second to the former president, and he is able to get 50 percent or more of the vote in Iowa, it could be difficult for them to garner enough momentum to have a decent showing in New Hampshire.