The winner of the first GOP debate: Glenn Youngkin

During presidential primary season, brutal honesty can be viewed as political kryptonite by candidates seeking to spin the media, the voters — and even themselves.

That acknowledged, let’s shine a bit of that green kryptonite glow on the eight Republican candidates who participated in the debate last night, which was hosted by Fox News and moderated by Martha MacCallum and Bret Baier.

There were of course, nine candidates who qualified, but former President Donald Trump — wisely, in my opinion — chose to skip the debate while engaging in counter-programming with Tucker Carlson. 

So, that left Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, current South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, former Vice President Mike Pence, current North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy to duke it out for second place behind Trump. 

That green kryptonite reveals that, at the moment, no one other than DeSantis has even a hope of becoming the Republican nominee. And while DeSantis is the closest — if you can call trailing Trump by 40 points in the RealClearPolitics average close — he did himself no favors by coming out of the gate with canned answers while looking stiff and over-caffeinated. 

Other than Haley, Christie and Burgum, the other five candidates seemed to be trying to top each other with one practiced bumper-sticker answer after the other. It was political pablum on steroids — and it was insulting to voters desperate to hear real answers to problems that are turning their lives upside down.

Burgum may have come across as the most genuine candidate in the bunch and he has zero chance of becoming the nominee. 

Behind the scenes, Republican power brokers are tearing their hair out in frustration and anger because they truly believe the Democrats are gifting them a “dumpster fire candidate” with either Joe Biden or Kamala Harris as the potential Democratic nominee for 2024 while the Republicans are once again getting ready to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory with a slate of primary candidates looking less presidential by the day.

Prior to the debate, it was said — ad nauseum in much of the media — that DeSantis had the most to lose. While he did seem to loosen up towards the end of the debate, he did not step up the way many of his supporters hoped. 

DeSantis further lost momentum and a chance to shine because much of the debate time was taken up by the “toddlers in the sandbox” spats between Ramaswamy and Pence or Ramaswamy and Christie.

Speaking of Ramaswamy, he may be about to learn the hard way that in politics, you’re the “next great hope” until you are instantly demoted to “just another dope.” 

The 38-year-old multimillionaire did himself no favors with his own canned answers — smug and condescending at times — or by intimating that all but him on the stage were “bought and paid for” by special interests.

For most of the race, the rising “golden child” of the GOP primary has been sailing in smooth waters because he was well out of range. Instantly, the waters have turned turbulent.

Just prior to the debate, he was forced to deal with a miscue of his own making. While on CNN, Ramaswamy went after anchor Kaitlin Collins and later compared her to a “petulant teenager.” 

Except, it was Ramaswamy who some thought came across as “petulant,” petty, and bullying.

Ramaswamy had taken issue with Collins daring to question him about remarks that he made to The Atlantic magazine suggesting that federal agents were on board the hijacked airliners that were flown into the World Trade Center nearly 22 years ago.

Ramaswamy denied to Collins that he said any such thing.

Whoops. Roll the tape. 

The following day, Collins played audio of Ramaswamy’s interview with The Atlantic. “About last night,” said the CNN anchor. “Vivek Ramaswamy said something that it turns out wasn’t true…”

On the recording, Ramaswamy clearly says: “How many federal agents were on the planes that hit the Twin Towers?” Collins quickly, and rightfully, received support from an unlikely source — former Fox News anchor and current podcast star Megyn Kelly. “Kaitlin Collins was right,” Kelly wrote on her X account on Tuesday. “Vivek was not misquoted by The Atlantic. And his attempt to say this controversy is all the dishonest media’s fault is itself dishonest.”

Ramaswamy needs to understand that it takes just one slip up to cause millions of voters who were warming to you and your vision to suddenly question your viability, veracity or empathy. And during the debate, a super-rich young guy smugly telling the country that it isn’t complicated to fix the daunting and escalating problems of the United States may not be the best first impression. 

All of which brings us to the other GOP political force who was not on the stage: Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin. 

More and more highly experienced Republicans I speak with tell me they wish Youngkin would jump into the race. Many are DeSantis supporters who no longer believe the Florida governor is the answer in 2024. These same Republicans have come to view Youngkin as the “adult in the room” who has the best chance to beat any Democratic nominee in 2024. 

Not only do they believe it, but according to the Washington Post, media mogul Rupert Murdoch also believes it and has been quietly trying to convince Youngkin to enter the race. 

Will Youngkin jump in? As of two days ago, he was not ruling out getting into the race as he repeatedly — and wisely — dodged the question.

After the shambles of last night’s Republican debate, Youngkin may emerge as the real winner.

Douglas MacKinnon, a political and communications consultant, was a writer in the White House for Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, and former special assistant for policy and communications at the Pentagon during the last three years of the Bush administration.