now. live from drake university in des moines, iowa, this is the cnn republican presidential debate. we want to welcome our viewers in the united states and around the world watching us on cnn. cnn max, cnn international, cnn in espanol, and cnn.com. good evening. i m jake tapper moderating tonight s debate alongside my friend and colleague dana bash. and just five days from now, voters here in iowa will cast the first votes of the 2024 presidential race. tonight the very first one-on-one matchup between top contenders, governor ron desantis and former governor and u.n. ambassador nikki haley. former president trump met the requirements for tonight s debate but declined to participate. our commitment in this debate is to provide as much information as possible to voters, especially here in iowa before the first contests begin next week. so in choosing topics, we focused on the issues important to republicans. let s bring out the candidates now. please welcome florida
good evening from washingtone four cent-mac type mac o international outrage after israel admits dozens of civilians were killed in an airstrike in rafah.fa plusll we take you to a remote jungle in columbia for our whatever happens segment on pablo escobar s infamous cocaine hippos. bu digt a bear with a memorial y special, dipping into efforts to solve some of america s mysteries. locating and inviting servicemembers who remain missing in action. we begin first with a democracy 24 report,da president biden spo his day honoring servicemembers who died in the line of duty, tonight we are learning he siden planning to break his silence on former president trumps colonel trier, closing arguments in manhattan begin tomorrow.s overth the weekend, robert f. c kennedy junior addressed the libertarian party s convention hoping for a chance to swaydo third-party voters.de right notaw we have the details from the north lawn it tonight, hello peter soo and gooder evening, even to the
Again. i look around the country. there is parts of iowa that have been hollowed out, particularly in the eastern part. i talked to folks and seen what that did for the community. we were sold a bill of goods by elites in the country putting china on the wto was going to lead to our manufacturing exporting a bunch of stuff there. instead, they gobbled up so much more manufacturing. i don t think you can be a first rate power unless you have a strong industrial base. we are going to do that here. we will work on work force education. not everyone needs to do a four year brick and ivy university. that s not the best way or only way for people to succeed. we will do skilled trades, vocational. we have done that in florida. it s going to be a really, really big thing. but i just think the middle of the country has to have those good paying jobs and we can t put the interests of some of the people on wall street over the interests of americans on main street. let s move on to social secur
I ll tell you, ron continues to sit there and talk about china. he has done expansions in china. his biggest donor that is backed by china gave them $340,000. so don t go and talk about donors and money. go to desantis lies.com look, i know governer desantis your record hurts. you are talking the opposite of what you did. you were made a big effort to bring them to the state, land near a military base, you were in front of the chinese flag saying you worked for then, wrote a love letter to the ambassador. that s documented. you were the number one republican governor in the country. even people on the media hostile to me can t find me as governor recruiting a chinese company. i haven t done it. desantis lies.com. so here is the thing. she is backed by companies like black rock, backed by major companies on wall street. they make a lot of money in china. there is a reason why you re in the mes
You get taxed your entire life, life expectancy is down. you may not be rekoupg very many benefits. thank you, governor. governor haley? three years in a row he voted to raise life expectancy to 70 years old. three years in a row. are go to desantis lies.com and you ll see it. now he is going to tell you because he is running for president he is not going to do it. you can t trust him. social security is going to go bankrupt in ten years. medicare is going bankrupt in eight. he talks about taking care of seniors. right now florida has is the inflation hot spot, the highest cost of living of any state in the country. seniors are having to leave because they can t afford it. it s documented on desantis lies.com. what we have to do is we have to keep our promises to seniors. we can t hut our head in the sand. saying you are not going to touch social security means they will leave after four, eight