Former President Donald Trump’s election rivals stepped up their attack against him despite still leading as the Republican Party’s presidential pick for 2024.
During the second Republican presidential debate, which Trump did not attend again, several of his opponents took him directly.
“He should be on this stage tonight,” said Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is attempting to establish himself as the Trump alternative despite recent struggles in the polls. “He owes it to you to defend his record where they added $7.8 trillion to the debt. That set the stage for the inflation we have now.”
Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who has also built his campaign around criticizing Trump, said the former president “hides behind the walls of his golf clubs and won’t show up here to answer questions like all the rest of us are up here to answer.”
Billionaire entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, meanwhile, distanced himself from trashtalking Trump and argued instead that he was a natural successor.
“Yes, I will respect Donald Trump and his legacy because it’s the right thing to do,” Ramaswamy said. “But we will unite this country to take the America First agenda to the next level. And that will take a different generation to do it.”
This comes as Trump is still the leading pick as the Republican presidential candidate, according to a recent poll. The Economist and YouGov asked around 1,500 U.S. adult citizens between August 26 and 29 who they would vote for if “the Republican presidential primary in your state were held today.”
Results show that 51 percent are in favor of Trump, while DeSantis comes in second with 14 percent. Ramaswamy comes in a distant third with five percent. Haley comes in fourth with four percent, followed by former Vice President Mike Pence with three percent, Christie with two percent, and South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott with two percent.
While the candidates were fighting for second place, Trump joined in with the striking workers of the United Auto Workers against America’s “Big Three” automakers.
“The workers of America are getting – I’m going to put it very nicely – screwed, you’re getting screwed,” he said in Michigan. “Yesterday Joe Biden posed for photos at the picket line. But it is his policies that sent Michigan autoworkers to the unemployment line.
