Trump under fire

In the first Republican presidential debate since Super Tuesday, Donald Trump’s competition worked furiously to unpack all of his baggage in front of voters before he gains more delegates in upcoming primaries.

Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas and Marco Rubio of Florida came on stage in Detroit on the offense, taking advantage of every opportunity to attack Trump’s character and shoot down his policy ideas.

In one of the most heated exchanges of the night, Rubio and Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly took turns describing the downfall of Trump University, an educational program that cost some participants up to $36,000 to get “stuff they can pull off of Zillow,” Rubio said. Participants have filed a class-action lawsuit against Trump.

“He’s trying to do to the American voter what he did to the people who signed up for this course,” Rubio said of Trump. “He’s trying to con people into giving him their vote just like he conned people into giving him their money.”

Trump responded by promising he would win the lawsuit in court in a few years.

Rubio, who appeared to be fighting off a cold, seemed to have more ammunition in his anti-Trump arsenal than Cruz, who mostly focused on Trump’s past support of Democratic presidential candidates. Rubio hammered Trump for outsourcing his clothing manufacturing business to Mexico and China, for abusing the H-2B visa program to get cheap labor, and for giving an alleged off-the-record interview to The New York Times in which he reportedly said he wasn’t as serious about cracking down on illegal immigration as he made it seem.

Trump spent most of the debate on the defensive, though he did take some time to explain how his approach to politics differs from other stauncher conservatives.

“There’s always give and take; there’s always negotiation,” he said, adding later, “I have a very strong core, but I have never seen a successful businessperson who wasn’t flexible.”

Trump’s supposed flexibility later came up in a Rubio one-liner about yoga as Cruz told an aggravated Trump to “breathe, breathe, breathe.” But the yoga joke seemed light after the insults exchanged at the opening of the debate: Trump made a reference to his sex life and called Rubio “Little Marco,” and Rubio retorted with the nickname “Big Don.”

Ohio Gov. John Kasich, currently in last place with voters in an average of national polls, shied away from attacking his opponents and repeatedly touted his executive leadership experience. But his stance on religious liberty did get some attention from debate moderators, who asked him whether business owners who disagree with gay marriage have the right to refuse to provide services for same-sex weddings.

“I’d rather people figure this out without having to put another law on the books,” Kasich said, adding that he didn’t agree with same-sex couples suing photographers and bakers who rejected their patronage. Kasich’s tender-footed response set up Cruz to make one of his strongest stances of the night: “When it comes to the Bill of Rights, I can tell the men and women at home I will never compromise away your religious liberty.”

By the end of the debate, Cruz and Rubio had seemingly done all they could to weaken Trump’s standing with voters, but they—and Trump—acknowledged an even greater threat in the election: Hillary Clinton. In response to the question of whether they would support the eventual Republican nominee—even if it was Trump—Cruz, Rubio, and Kasich all said they would. And Trump said he’d return the favor, calming for now fears that the most contentious GOP primary race in years could lead to a split in the Republican Party.