Trump more than doubles national lead in NBC/WSJ poll

Cruz forcefully defended his ability to serve as president.

Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump and top challenger Ted Cruz clashed sharply on Thursday over the Texas senator’s eligibility to run for the White House during a tense debate weeks before voters start to pick the party’s nominee.

The previous night, Cruz and Trump traded blows on various topics.

It took only a few minutes into the debate until Trump and Cruz locked horns.

Rubio was hit by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who said the lawmaker talks so much it’s hard to keep track of whether he’s telling the truth.

There is only one more GOP debate scheduled before the Iowa caucus on February 1st. But the likelihood of a major shakeup in the race becomes less and less as days pass.

But by the end of the night it seemed certain that Thursday’s debate would largely not change the 2016 race.

Cruz also noted some “birther theories” say a candidate must have two parents born on USA soil to be eligible to run. In that interview, Cruz said Frank Sinatra’s song “New York, New York” might be a more appropriate anthem, because Trump “comes from New York, and he embodies New York values”.

Asked about the issue by a debate moderator, Cruz reminded the audience that Trump had once said Cruz’s citizenship was a non-issue.

The evening also saw Trump slammed by Ted Cruz, the man the polls are showing to be his biggest rival, for having “New York values”. As he did during the debate, Trump urged voters to instead think about the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

“I appreciate you dumping your opposition research folder on the debate stage”, the Texan said.

Cruz came into the debate with two clouds hanging over the campaign.

“All Muslims? Seriously? What kind of signal does that send to the rest of the world?”

And billionaire Donald Trump said he would secure United States borders to keep out migrants who wanted to do the United States harm. The other Arab countries have a role to play in this.

A Reuters/Ipsos rolling national poll on January 12 showed Trump had 39 percent of the vote, Mr Cruz 14.5 percent, Bush 10.6 percent, Carson 9.6 percent, while 6.7 percent favoured Rubio. Trump said, who-to his credit-admitted the reason he was attacking Cruz was because the senator was performing better in polls.

None did. But not for lack of trying.

“Donald Trump! Stop the hate”, they chanted before being removed from the coffee shop. Kasich called for unity.

While President Obama’s State of the Union dominated the news cycle, it was the temporary arrest of ten US sailors by the Iranian government that led Texas Sen. And Rubio blasted Obama for presiding over an “arrogant” foreign policy.

Christie strongly disagreed – and he said that while two years ago Rubio called him a “conservative reformer”, now he is misrepresenting his record. “And you can’t do that to the party….you have to have certainty”. In his closing statement, Cruz mentioned the Michael Bay movie “13 Hours” which depicts the attack on a US diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya, that occurred during Clinton’s tenure as secretary of state.

And Rubio was among several candidates who criticized Trump for threatening to impose tariffs on Chinese goods – tariffs that would be paid by American consumers, the Florida senator said.

There was little love for Clinton’s rival, Bernie Sanders.

However, the question remains whether or not the seven candidates on stage will be able to shift the polls heading into the first election contests.