Democratic voters provided "shocking" praise for a key exchange during the second GOP primary debate when former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley sounded the alarm on the growing threat from China.
"We're going to go after China because China is the one sending the fentanyl in the first place," she said in Simi Valley, California, Wednesday. "And we will end all normal trade relations until China stops sending fentanyl. And then we'll do the special operations, and we'll get it from both sides. This is where President Trump went wrong."
"He focused on trade with China. He didn't focus on the fact that they were buying up our farmland. He didn't focus on the fact that they were killing Americans. He didn't focus on the fact that they were stealing $600 billion in intellectual property," she continued. "We need to start focusing on what keeps Americans safe. That hasn't happened in a long time. As your president, I will make sure every American is safe."
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Republicans gave Haley an A for her answer, and Democrats and independents alike awarded her with B grades, according to pollster Lee Carter, who showed voters' real-time reactions to key moments in the debate.
"This was shocking to me," Carter said during "FOX & Friends" Thursday. "Nikki Haley really has a resonance with Democrats and also a big appeal to independents, so you can see she's going to probably surge a little bit more in the polls. I'm not sure it's going to be enough to catch those 40 points that she needs to catch up, but certainly, I think she had a good night last night."
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis also garnered bipartisan support for one of his key answers addressing the border crisis and providing an effective solution to mitigate the migrant surge.
"As commander in chief, I'm going to use the U.S. military to go after the Mexican drug cartels," he said. "They are killing our people. And this border is going to be a day one issue for me as president. We're going to declare it a national emergency."
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"Yes, we'll build the wall. We'll do remain in Mexico, but those Mexican drug cartels are going to be treated like the foreign terrorist organizations that they are," he continued.
Carter noted Republicans gave his position an A grade, while independents gave him a B and Democrats surprisingly came in with a C grade.
"They really liked that he had a strong position on this, but not only a strong position, but he was offering up a solution," Carter said. "A lot of people are talking about the porous border. A lot of people are talking about how bad things are, not talking about something different.
"This really broke through and Democrats here even gave it a C," she continued. "Democrats acknowledge this is a really big concern and there's something there that they wanted to hear more about."
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South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott and tech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy also engaged in a discussion about China, with Scott calling out the biotech CEO for doing business with the CCP.
"Last debate, he said we were all bought and paid for," Scott told Ramaswamy. "I thought about that for a little while and said… 'I can't imagine how you can say that, knowing that you were just in business with the Chinese Communist Party. And the same people that funded Hunter Biden millions of dollars was a partner of yours as well."
"When every other CEO expanded into the Chinese market, you know what I did with my first company? We opened a subsidiary in China," Ramaswamy shot back. "But you know what I did that was different than every other company? We got the hell out of there."
GOP voters gave the exchange an A, while independents graded it with a B and Democrats weren't far behind with a C grade.
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Carter said voters seemed to enjoy the attack on Ramaswamy and the "strength" Scott displayed during the exchange.
"On the other hand, it's hard to really say they loved it because when you say they're attacking each other, there's a lot of cross-fighting, and it's not like people are going to say it's off the charts. But I think people thought it was a good point. They wanted to see a different side of Tim Scott, and they did."
The third GOP primary debate will take place in November in Miami.
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