The second GOP debate field will be a bit smaller — and still missing Trump. Follow live updates
By The Associated Press
Follow along for live updates on the second 2024 Republican presidential debate, which begins at 9 p.m. ET in California. The field’s early front-runner, Donald Trump, is skipping the event, just as he did the first. He’ll be 2,000 miles away trying to woo union workers in Michigan amid a labor strike.
The candidates on stage will be Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former Vice President Mike Pence, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum.
What to know
— 7 candidates qualified for the second debate. Here’s who missed the cut — Here’s how to watch tonight’s debate — Republicans face growing urgency to stop Trump ahead of debate — Trump heads to Michigan to compete with Biden for union votes — Who’s running for president? See a rundown of the 2024 candidates
Biden raising campaign cash while GOP rivals debate
While Republicans prepare for tonight’s debate, the Democratic president that they’re hoping to replace will be raising money for his reelection campaign on the West Coast.
Joe Biden has a pair of fundraisers in San Francisco on Wednesday, a day after holding another one in Atherton.
“I’m optimistic that people in America know what’s at stake and they’re going to step up,” he told donors on Tuesday. Biden also said “I’m looking forward to the race.”
Biden’s visit to California is the second stop on his trip. He first visited Michigan, where he joined striking auto workers on the picket line, and he plans to head to Arizona, where he’s scheduled to give a speech on democracy.
Will immigration return to the debate stage?
The first Republican presidential debate devoted about 10 minutes to the U.S.-Mexico border, and the influx of asylum-seekers has only jumped since then.
Numbers are surging, with migrants now being housed at Chicago airports after police station lobbies filled with families in sleeping bags and nearly 6,000 migrants crossed the border in tiny Eagle Pass, Texas, in two days. Local officials from New York to San Diego sounded increasingly desperate cries for federal aid, as the Biden administration said it was making nearly 500,000 Venezuelans already in the United States eligible for temporary work permits.
Discussion of immigration in the first debate largely focused on building more border wall and, to varying degrees, supporting deployment of U.S. troops to Mexico to combat fentanyl trafficking.
A broadcasting first for a Republican debate
Television executives say Wednesday will mark the first time a Republican primary debate is broadcast in Spanish, with Univision airing it along with Fox Business.
The Spanish-language network has called this “an opportunity for Hispanic voters to hear directly from the candidates on issues that are important to them.”
Univision was not chosen for the GOP primary debates in 2015 after Republican National Committee officials said there were questions about whether the network was treating the party fairly. Later that year, Trump kicked the network’s famous news anchor Jorge Ramos out of a news conference after being questioned about his immigration plan. In 2020, Trump’s reelection campaign called the network a “leftist propaganda machine and a mouth piece for the Democratic party.”
Trump notably will be missing from Wednesday night’s debate.
Trump plans prime-time speech to union workers in lieu of debate
The former president is scheduled to deliver prime-time remarks to union members in Michigan shortly before the second debate begins without him in California.
He will be giving a speech at 8 p.m. Eastern at Drake Enterprises, a non-unionized auto parts supplier in Clinton Township. He’ll speak before a crowd of several hundred current and former United Auto Workers members, as well as members of plumbers and pipefitters unions.
His visit comes a day after President Joe Biden became the first sitting president in U.S. history to walk a picket line as he joined UAW members in Detroit. The union has expanded its strike against Detroit automakers by walking out of spare-parts warehouses in 20 states across the country.
Trump will be seeking to position himself as an ally of blue-collar workers by promising to raise wages and protect jobs if elected to a second term. But union leaders say Trump’s record tells a different story. They cite unfavorable rulings from the nation’s top labor board and the U.S. Supreme Court, as well as unfulfilled promises of automotive jobs.
Reagan’s library is the setting for the second GOP presidential debate
When seven presidential hopefuls gather at Ronald Reagan’s presidential library for the second Republican debate, expect to hear homages to the “Great Communicator.”
The 40th president remains a hugely popular influence in today’s Republican Party, and the candidates for the 2024 nomination frequently reference him in their speeches.
Former Vice President Mike Pence most often cites Reagan, noting his own pride in advising the Trump administration’s Supreme Court nominees “that sent Roe. v. Wade to the ash heap of history where it belongs.”
Hutchinson misses debate stage but vows to stay in race
Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson will miss Wednesday’s debate after failing to meet the criteria to participate. But he says he’s not going anywhere.
In a statement after the candidate field was released Monday night, Hutchinson said he measures his success by the voter response he gets in early voting states like Iowa and New Hampshire. He says his goal is to boost his polling numbers to 4% in one of those states before Thanksgiving.
“If that goal is met, then I remain competitive and in contention,” he wrote.
In lieu of the second debate, he is going to be in Detroit — the same city Trump is traveling to. He plans to hold a press conference to highlight what he says are the former president’s “false promises to blue collar and union workers in Michigan and across America.”
