DES MOINES, Iowa—Presidential candidates Ron DeSantis and Nikki Haley fielded questions from voters 11 days before the Iowa caucus, appearing consecutively on the same stage in a town hall meeting on Jan. 4.
The televised event represented a narrowing of the Republican field, though the clear frontrunner for the nomination, former President Donald Trump, was not in attendance.
Mr. DeSantis, the incumbent governor of Florida appeared for the first hour of the primetime event. Ms. Haley, a former U.N. ambassador and two-term governor of South Carolina, took the second hour.
When it comes to uniting America, Ms. Haley said that the “tone at the top matters.”
Ms. Haley also talked about transparency in and cleaning up government, reiterating her Day One promise to tackle agencies and get rid of old regulations, replace their heads and fire “problem children.”
She said that she would then go to Congress and tell them enough with the fingerpointing at that the “buck stops here.” Ms. Haley said calling out wrongdoing is a part of serving the people.
Former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley talked about how she might respond if she wins and her chief Republican rival, former President Donald Trump, is convicted of any crime.
President Trump is facing numerous indictments as well as civil cases and attempts to boot him from the ballot in several states.
She likened the situation to what happened with former President Richard Nixon, who resigned from the office amid the Watergate scandal. His successor, former President Gerald Ford, pardoned him.
As a country, I think America has been ready for a woman, but it has to be the right woman,” she said.
While she thinks “women are rock stars,” she clarified that “we don’t support women just because they’re women.”
“I think what we've seen in politics for really a lot lately, is they look at a label, and they say oh, we're gonna get this label or we need this label. Well, that's what's gotten us into this mess,” she said.
Ms. Haley sought to clarify a controversial remark she made at a town hall in New Hampshire on Jan. 3, wherein she said the Granite State would “correct” the results from Iowa, alluding to a Trump win.
She said she was trying to be humorous and “having fun” in saying, “You know Iowa starts it. You know that you correct it. And then my sweet state of South Carolina brings it home. That’s what we do.”
She said she meant no disrespect to Iowans. “I’m fighting in every state because everyone is worth fighting for,” she said.
Former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley’s past stance on China has been a matter of dispute on the campaign trail, with her opponents highlighting her support for Chinese investments in the Palmetto State while she was at its helm.
She defended that record in response to a question from CNN host Erin Burnett, saying that “every governor in the country was trying to recruit Chinese companies ten years ago,” and arguing that the U.S. now knows better about China’s intentions than it did then.
“China has never wanted to be like us... They never should have gotten into the World Trade Organization,” Ms. Haley said.
Former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley was asked point-blank by a town hall attendee about voters’ worries that she would be “more of a war hawk versus a peace-through-strength leader.”
After noting her husband’s South Carolina National Guard deployment, Ms. Haley leaned into her experience as the nation’s representative before the United Nations.
“Ukraine was one of our friends. They voted with us on almost everything,” she said.
Ms. Haley noted that when she was ambassador to the U.N. she warned about Hamas maps showing what they could do if they broke through Gaza’s border with Israel, which has faced its latest conflict with the terrorist group since Oct. 7, when Hamas invaded Israel from Gaza and killed, took hostage and maimed Israelis.
Ms. Haley said that the following objectives need to happen: The United States should give Israel “whatever they need whenever they need it,” “finish” Hamas, and bring American hostages home.
She lamented the onus on civilian casualties being placed on Israel and not Hamas. She also blasted a ceasefire. “I think Israel is doing what they have to to make sure it doesn't happen again,” she said. “Because what did Hamas say? They're gonna go back and do it again, they're not finished.”
Ms. Haley called for tax cuts and simplifying the tax brackets in addition to eliminating the federal gas and diesel tax.
“Government has way too much money now,” she said.
She also called for making the income tax cuts permanent – which the 2017 tax reform did not do due to the budgetary rule that legislation passed through the mechanism called reconciliation, which allows certain bills to not be subject to the Senate filibuster.
Former United Nations ambassador Nikki Haley criticized former President Donald Trump’s foreign policy record.
The comments came after CNN’s host, Erin Burnett, asked Ms. Haley about whether her previous boss deserved the “chaos” she had claimed dogs him.
“Look at how he [Trump] deals with dictators,” she said, highlighting his past comments on Chinese leader Xi Jinping.
Ms. Haley praised Texas Gov. Greg Abbott for sending illegal immigrants to blue cities including New York City, saying it he has been “courageous” in doing so.
“I think it's been hugely effective because, all of a sudden, the rest of the country is feeling what Texans have had to deal with for so long,” she said.
Ms. Haley addressed the issue at America’s southern border, saying it as a national security crisis.
“America right now is acting like it's September 10,” she said. “We better remember what September 12 felt like because it only takes one. So you have 8 million people that have come to the border. And they've only sent 140,000 back. That's it. And so we're left with taking care of the health care of them. The education of those kids, law enforcement having to deal with them.”
She said she would implement the illegal immigration laws she implemented in South Carolina. That includes a national e-verify program for businesses, defunding sanctuary cities, putting 25,000 Border Patrol and ICE agents on the border, and ending the “catch and release” policy.
Ms. Haley reiterated her talking point that President Trump bring chaos whether it is justified or not. An example of chaos following him wrongly, she said, is some of the indictments against him, while an example of chaos following him “rightly” it is adding $8 trillion to the national debt.
At the end of the day, Ms. Haley called for “No more drama. No more taking things personally.” Ms. Haley reiterated that she easily beats Biden, according to the polls, while President Trump barely beats him.
She said a landslide would provide “a mandate” to institute change nationwide.
A self-described independent reporter who voted for President Joe Biden in 2020 asked Ms. Haley how she thinks she can catch up to Former President Donald Trump in the polls.
“Chaos follows him,” she said. “And we can't have a country in disarray and a world on fire and go through four more years of chaos. We won't survive it. And you don't defeat Democrat chaos with Republican chaos.
Now is the time we need to have a new generational leader.”
In response to the first question related to the Jan. 4 shooting at a high school in Perry, Iowa, where one person was killed, Ms. Haley expressed her condolences and thanked law enforcement.
She went on to say that mass shootings in the United States reflect “the cancer that is mental health” – which she has repeatedly said on the campaign trail.
She also called for securing schools as is the case with airports and courthouses.
Mr. DeSantis, a Navy veteran himself, shared his plans to reform veterans programs in the country.
“The VA ultimately is not going to be able to solve this problem by itself. It's too big of a bureaucracy,” he said. “ It's too cumbersome. I'm going to fire a lot of people in the VA. I'm gonna have accountability. They need to do a better job for the veterans.
He explained that he wants to implement a similar system to the CARE portal he instituted in Florida.
A young male from a farm family asked Mr. DeSantis what he would do to uplift rural communities.
One of the answers Mr. DeSantis gave that he would seek to eliminate the estate tax for farms. The estate tax is a tax on passing down one’s estate. He said that the tax is harmful to family farms, which should be the source of America’s food supply as “food security is national security.”
CNN Host Caitlin Collins asked Gov. Ron DeSantis about gay marriage, noting that another candidate, former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, has expressed regret about previously opposing gay marriage.
The Florida governor treaded carefully, saying that the traditional definition of marriage “is just what marriage is with the church,” before adding that he “respect[s] the Supreme Court’s decision,” Obergefell v. Hodges.
“We’ve abided by that in Florida even though our constitution defines it as between a man and a woman,” he continued, before stressing an angle often used by post-Obergefell social conservatives now forced into a corner on a polarizing issue: religious liberty.
Mr. DeSantis was asked to share about a mistake during his career and to explain how he adapted from it.
He immediately cited what he did at the start of COVID-19 pandemic.
“Donald Trump and Anthony Fauci plunged this country into lockdown Florida led the way in dragging this country out of lockdown,” he said. “And part of the reason we did that is because I looked at some of the things that were recommended that we had done.”
Mr. DeSantis reflected on what his sister Christina DeSantis’ death meant to him.
Ms. Christina DeSantis was 30 years old when she lost her fight with cancer in 2015. Mr. Ron DeSantis said his sister would have been a great aunt who would have loved his three children.
In response to a supporter of Ms. Haley asking Mr. DeSantis for his “definition of patriotism” whether those who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, were patriotic.
Mr. DeSantis said no, but quickly pivoted to lamenting the issues in the military from recruiting to the “woke” and “nonsense” in the armed forces.
“We are going to hold up military service as being something that's a noble cause,” he said.
When asked if he thought former President Donald Trump was pro-life, Mr. DeSantis said, “of course not!”
“I mean, when you're saying that pro-life protections are a terrible thing by definition, you are not pro-life,” he said. “When you say that you want to have a federal law at 18 weeks or 20 weeks that would override a state like Iowa that has enacted pro-life protections, that would mean more abortions, not less abortions, because very few abortions are happening that late anyways, so he has flip-flopped on this issue.
He questioned whether President Trump’s actions were due to political convenience, or if he was showing what he actually believed in.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was also pressed on foreign policy, with a focus on one of Washington’s hottest hot potatoes: funding for Ukraine in its war with Russia.
It began with a query from Ames, Iowa, attorney Eric Eide about whether the United States should continue to sink resources into that conflict.
As is often the case, Mr. DeSantis leaned into talk of China and criticized some of Ukraine’s actions before concluding that “we need to bring this to a conclusion,” and again calling for European countries to pay more.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was quickly confronted with a question about former President Donald J. Trump’s significant polling lead during CNN’s town hall.
“What do you consider a winning performance?” one questioner, Curt Ellis of Grimes, Iowa, asked, after noting President Trump’s strength in those surveys.
“I’ve gotten to all 99 counties,” Mr. DeSantis responded, reiterating his frequent challenges to President Trump for failing to appear at various debates.
Mr. DeSantis restated his stance on immigration and border security: deport those here illegally, take military action against the cartels, which should be designated as Foreign Terrorist Organizations – a designation that allows the United States to unlock numerous tools to combat them. Al Qaeda, ISIS, Hamas and Hezbollah are a few of the numerous FTOs.
He reiterated that he would also end birthright citizenship – those born in the United States to parents in the country illegally.
“That is not what the Fourteenth Amendment is intended to do,” he said.
The first question Florida’s Gov. Ron DeSantis faced from potential Iowa voters and caucus-goers focused on a school shooting that took place earlier that day, specifically how he would address gun violence without taking away any gun rights.
“This is a tragedy to lose a sixth grader,” he said. “My wife and I, we have a first grader a kindergartener and a preschooler. And so when you send your kids to school, you know you want to be focused on the academics and the activities.
He cited some of the changes he made after the school shooting that happened in his own state, including the Parkland shooting.
Mr. DeSantis stepped onto the stage and immediately took a shot at Ms. Haley for confusing Iowa Hawkeyes basketball star Caitlin Clark with Ms. Collins, the CNN moderator, who accepted a Clark jersey and even joked that “her free throws are better than mine.” This comes days after Ms. Collins joked that she could help the football team at her alma mater the University of Alabama, who lost a Jan. 1 football playoff game against the University of Michigan.
Former South Carolina governor and U.N. Ambassador Nikkie Haley and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis take the stage as former President Donald Trump has been dominating the polls.
In Iowa, the former president enjoys a formidable lead at 50 percent compared with Mr. DeSantis at 18 percent, Ms. Haley at 16 percent, and Mr. Ramaswamy at 6 percent. While Ms. Haley has been gaining momentum in both Iowa and New Hampshire, she has made a few hiccups in the past several days. One was not initially acknowledging that slavery was a cause of the Civil War. Another was mistaking Iowa Hawkeyes basketball star Caitlin Clark for Kaitlan Collins.
On the political trail, Mr. DeSantis and Ms. Haley have campaigned primarily against President Joe Biden rather than their Republican opponents. That has shifted recently as the GOP field has narrowed and caucusgoers are finalizing their choice between the top three or four candidates. Mr. DeSantis and Ms. Haley are likely to use this event to distance themselves from one another and from President Trump.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley will take part in back-to-back town-hall-style meetings in Iowa on Jan. 4, just 11 days before the Iowa caucuses, the first-in-the-nation presidential nominating contest.
The event, organized by CNN, features the two Republicans who have mounted the strongest challenge to former President Donald Trump, who continues to lead most national and Iowa polls by a wide margin.