Terror Takes Center Stage at Republican Presidential Debate Candidates debate how best to combat Islamic State and keep America safe By Patrick O’Connor and Janet Hook
http://www.wsj.com/articles/terror-takes-center-stage-at-republican-presidential-debate-1450236155
LAS VEGAS—Republican presidential contenders clashed Tuesday over how to protect the country from a future terrorist attack and what role the U.S. should play on an increasingly tumultuous world stage.
The result was a policy focused debate that opened divisions—and sparked personal attacks—between the party’s top candidates over how far to go in monitoring Americans’ phone data, whether to deploy more U.S. troops to the Middle East and the merits of regime change.
The centerpiece of the showdown was the evolving feud between Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas and Marco Rubio of Florida, two leading contenders to be Donald Trump’s primary alternative. The two senators fought over data-collection, military spending, immigration and whether to topple Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
While Mr. Trump remains the front-runner, the fight between Messrs. Cruz and Rubio intensified a long-standing split inside the GOP between conservative insurgents and more pragmatic Republicans, a power struggle that has dogged the party for years.
Mr. Trump also endured another round of pointed attacks, but he vowed not to run as an independent if he doesn’t win the Republican presidential nomination. He also had kind words for Mr. Cruz, after days of sniping about the Texas senator who is running neck-and-neck with him in Iowa.
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, trying to reassert himself in the race, delivered the sharpest blows, questioning Mr. Trump’s proposal to ban Muslims from traveling to the U.S. and arguing the businessman lacks the knowledge and judgment to be commander-in-chief.
“Donald, you know, is great at one-liners, but he’s a chaos candidate and he would be a chaos president,” Mr. Bush said.
Mr. Trump tried to brush aside the constant needling from Mr. Bush, attributing the criticism to the former Florida governor’s sagging poll numbers. “He doesn’t really believe I’m unhinged,” Mr. Trump said. “He said that very simply because his campaign has been a total disaster.”
National security has surged as the pre-eminent issue for Americans broadly, and Republicans in particular, following a wave of coordinated terrorist attacks in Paris and a mass shooting in San Bernardino, Calif., carried out by radicalized Muslims. Three-quarters of GOP primary voters list it as one of their top-two concerns, up from 53% in April, according to the latest Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll.
ENLARGE The debate Tuesday exposed a fundamental divide among the Republicans gathered on stage at The Venetian Hotel and Casino about what role the U.S. should play in the world. The candidates split, for example, over whether the American military should oust a foreign dictator, even if their interests align with the U.S.
“These are the fundamental questions of our time, whether regime change is a good idea or a bad idea,” Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul said. “It has not worked out. From regime you have chaos.”
The attacks in Paris and California, coupled with ongoing tumult overseas, have Republicans looking for a nominee who will be more assertive on the world stage. Two-thirds of GOP primary voters think the U.S. “has not been strong enough” and allowed Russia, China and Islamic State to extend their influence, according to the Journal poll, while roughly a quarter of those voters think policy makers should focus more on domestic concerns.
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One of the night’s fiercest debates centered around a controversial National Security Agency program to collect the phone records of millions of Americans. Mr. Rubio has been critical of Mr. Cruz for voting for legislation that ended the program.
Mr. Cruz defended his support for that bill Tuesday night, saying the legislation ensured the program focuses more on “targeting the bad guys” than collecting other Americans’ phone data. The Texas senator called out Mr. Rubio and an affiliated super PAC for running ads criticizing him on the issue. Mr. Cruz argued his rival “knows what he is saying is not true.”
Mr. Rubio also came under attack from Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, who has called for total elimination of the phone data collection program. Mr. Paul argued that national security has been hurt by Mr. Rubio’s support for legislation that would liberalize immigration policy, and faulted him for opposing more-recent efforts to curb immigration to screen out potential terrorists.
“Marco has opposed at every point increased border security,” he said. “Marco can’t have it both ways.”
Public opinion among GOP primary voters tilts decidedly in Mr. Rubio’s favor. Some 68% said they worry more about the government not doing enough to track potential terrorists than they do about the government violating individuals’ privacy rights, while just 27% said they were more concerned about privacy.
ENLARGE The squabble among the senators prompted New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, returning to the main stage, to pitch himself as a seasoned executive who has made difficult decisions, criticizing his rivals for diving too deeply into the weeds of a legislative debate at a time Americans want to see real resolve.
“If your eyes are glazed over like mine, this is what it’s like to be on the floor of the U.S. Senate,” Mr. Christie said. “Let’s talk about how we do this, not about which bill one of these guys like more.”
Messrs. Cruz and Rubio also argued over whether to allow legal status to immigrants living in the U.S. illegally. Mr. Cruz cast the Florida senator as teaming up with Democrats to support an “amnesty plan” when the Senate debated an immigration reform bill in 2013, while Mr. Rubio argued that they had both been on the same side of the issue.
Mr. Cruz stressed that he doesn’t support “legalization” for those living in the U.S. illegally now. He has long opposed offering a pathway to citizenship to immigrants in the U.S. illegally, but has been less clear on the subject of legal status. Mr. Rubio threw Mr. Cruz on the defensive by demanding he explain how he would handle the illegal immigrants already living in the U.S. Mr. Cruz awkwardly said he didn’t “intend” to support legalizing those people.
Onetime front-runner Ben Carson, a retired neurosurgeon, has tumbled out of the top tier in most public-opinion surveys in the face of questions about his grasp of foreign policy. Before the debate, Mr. Carson rolled out seven specific steps he would take to blunt the threat posed by Islamic State, also known as ISIS, including a formal declaration of war, new requirements for visa holders and deploying National Guard troops to the Mexican and Canadian borders.
This increased focus on national security hasn’t undercut Mr. Trump’s standing as the clear front-runner in the GOP race, with the businessman padding his lead in the weeks since violence erupted in Paris. His call to ban Muslims from entering the U.S. generated swift rebukes from most of his rivals, as well as GOP leaders in Washington, but his stance splits GOP primary voters evenly, with 38% favoring the proposal and 39% opposed.
Mr. Trump doubled down on his call to shut down the Internet for members of Islamic State, and called for recruiting “our most brilliant minds to figure a way that ISIS cannot use the Internet.” He added that U.S. officials should be able to “penetrate” the Internet to learn “where ISIS is and everything about ISIS.”
Mr. Bush used Tuesday’s debate to try to climb back into the race after sagging in the polls, repeatedly targeting Mr. Trump. At one point, he seemed to get under the front-runner’s skin for questioning his understanding of complex foreign-policy issues. “Donald, you’re not going to be able to insult your way to the presidency,” Mr. Bush said. “Leadership is not about attacking people or disparaging people.”
ENLARGE Republicans with an eye on the general election have a political interest in keeping national security on the front burner because the Democratic front-runner, Hillary Clinton, will struggle to distance herself from President Barack Obama’s foreign policy record, given her tenure as his secretary of state. Some 57% of Americans disapprove of Mr. Obama’s handling of foreign policy, according to the Journal poll.
Mrs. Clinton split with the president by supporting a no-fly zone with Syria, a position supported by many Republicans running. She also advocates increased airstrikes against ISIS fighters in Iraq and Syria and a safe zone for Syrian refugees, also in line with her would-be Republican rivals. But those positions haven’t stopped Republicans from continuing their efforts to tether her record to Mr. Obama’s.
“Republicans will certainly be on offense against Hillary, who can’t disown Obama’s foreign policy record because she supported and implemented it,” said Brian Hook, a foreign policy expert who held various senior positions on President George W. Bush’s administration and now advises manu of the current GOP candidates.
On Tuesday, the Democratic front-runner took steps to distance herself from Mr. Trump and other Republicans who cast the fight with ISIS as an existential conflict between the West and radical elements of Islam.
Mrs. Clinton traveled to Minneapolis, home to many foreign-born Muslims, to lay out steps she would take as president to work with Islamic leaders to prevent recruitment efforts by Islamic State and other terrorist groups and prevent American Muslims from radicalizing.
Attitudes have hardened in the wake of the Paris attacks and the carnage in California. Republicans have grown more resistant to allowing Syrian refugees to enter the U.S. Some 59% of GOP primary voters want to deny entry to all Syrians fleeing the fighting there, up from 35% in September. Among Democrats, just 20% share that view, while 41% of independents want to prevent any additional Syrians from entering the U.S.
—Reid J. Epstein contributed to this article.
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