Five things to expect from tonight’s GOP debate

SIMI VALLEY — Republicans are expecting a bare-knuckles brawl when 11 candidates take the stage for the party’s second presidential debate against the bucolic setting of the Reagan Library. 

{mosads}While the setting will be very different from the Cleveland basketball arena that hosted August’s first debate, it’s not expected that the candidates will hold their fire. 

Here’s why it’s likely to be a bloodbath — and what else you can expect.

Trump will come under attack 

Front-runner Donald Trump has gone toe-to-toe with Jeb Bush, Ben Carson, Scott Walker, Marco Rubio, Rand Paul and Carly Fiorina, and many of his rivals want to show on Wednesday that they don’t want to get pushed around. 

Several candidates also want to try to take Trump down to size; the business mogul has continued to dominate the GOP race since the first debate. 

Bush and Paul, a Kentucky senator, are almost certain to attack Trump, but the strategy could be different for Carson and Fiorina. 

This is the first time Fiorina, Hewlett-Packard’s former CEO, will be on the debate’s main stage, and Wednesday serves as an opportunity for her to introduce herself to a wider audience.

Carson, the former neurosurgeon who has jumped in the polls since August, recently called a ceasefire with Trump. It’s not clear how much he’d benefit — if at all — from going after Trump at this stage.

“It looks like Jeb Bush is going to go after [Trump], I know Rand Paul will,” Jeffrey Lord, a CNN political commentator and Trump supporter, told The Hill. “I’m not sure it’s a smart idea for these people because we’ve seen what’s happened when others have gone after him, but I think that’s what Trump can expect.” 

Trump, for his part, may also look to go after Fiorina or Carson. 

CNN will try to amplify the conflict 

Debate moderator Jake Tapper has made no secret that he wants to seek the candidates take off the gloves tonight. 

He has vowed to light the tinderbox of tension, saying he’ll be looking to pit the candidates against one another on policy issues meant to spotlight their differences. 

“What the team and I have been doing is trying to craft questions that, in most cases, pit candidates against the other — specific candidates on the stage — on issues where they disagree, whether it’s policy, or politics, or leadership. Let’s actually have them discuss and debate,” Tapper said on CNN last week. 

Establishment candidates will battle to break out 

The GOP establishment is having a tough primary so far. 

Bush was once considered the front-runner for the nomination, but is now in single digits in the polls and lacks a clear path to victory. 

Rubio, a Florida senator, has yet to see his campaign take off, while New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is barely in the top 10. 

Walker, Wisconsin’s governor, was once the favorite in Iowa. Since a lackluster showing in the first debate, however, his poll numbers have plummeted, and plenty of political observers wonder how long he can remain in the race. 

Given their struggles, Wednesday night is a crucial moment for all four politicians. 

“The stakes are a lot higher in this debate than one would ever expect in an September off-year debate,” Dan Pfeiffer, a longtime aide to President Obama who is in Simi Valley to analyze the debate for CNN, told The Hill. “There’s a handful of candidates who are one bad debate performance away from having their money dry up.” 

Bush at least doesn’t have to worry about that, but his supporters are looking for more life from the former Florida governor on Wednesday. 

Every candidate will claim Reagan’s mantle 

The candidates are debating at Reagan’s library, not far from his grave — and everyone on stage wants to claim “the Gipper’s” mantle. 

“I expect he’ll be invoked heavily tonight,” former Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.), who is in Simi Valley to commentate on the debate for CNN, told The Hill. 

Trump argues Reagan is a kindred spirit, and has used the Republican legend to explain his own liberal past. Reagan, like Trump, was a onetime Democrat. 

Carson and Walker frequently credit the former president with inspiring their interest in conservative politics, while Bush — whose father was Reagan’s vice president — touted his “Reagan-inspired” tax reform plan in an Orange County Register op-ed. 

Questions about Reagan’s actual policies are also likely. Reagan backed immigration reform that offered amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants, something the entire GOP field now opposes. And Reagan was known for working with Democrats to earn legislative victories, given the House’s Democratic majority throughout his presidency. How will the field answer questions about working with the other party? 

“Reagan’s presence will hang over the debate the same way it hangs over the entire party,” says Reagan biographer Craig Shirley. “You don’t hear candidates calling themselves Bush or Nixon Republicans. They all like to think of themselves as Reagan conservatives.” 

Foreign policy will play a major role 

“National security is going to be a much bigger issue this time around,” Republican strategist Alex Castellanos told The Hill outside the Reagan library. “That will benefit some of the more established insider candidates who have experience there.” 

Conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt will be one of the moderators, and he likes to get in the weeds with candidates through quiz-style questions meant to test their understanding of national security issues. 

Outsider candidates Trump, Carson and Fiorina, as well as governors like Walker, will be on the spot, needing to prove that the knowledge and skill-sets they bring from outside Washington will transfer to the White House. 

In recent weeks, Hewitt has tripped up Trump and Carson on foreign policy matters on his radio show, and the media has begun fact-checking Republican statements about the Syrian refugee crisis, ensnaring Carson and Walker over questionable claims.

Hewitt and Tapper said they won’t let those claims slide in the prime-time debate, and will likely be seeking substance over rhetoric, which has so far dominated Trump’s pitch to voters. 

“In the first debate we met this candidates, this one will focus on substance,” said Castellanos. “We want to see who can be president, and that means knowing something about foreign policy.”