Iowa poll: Cruz has slim lead over Trump

Ted Cruz campaigns in Iowa, where recent polls have his lead over Donald Trump slipping.

Moderators: FBN’s Sandra Smith and Trish Regan will moderate the 6 p.m. debate; FBN’s Managing Editor of Business News Neil Cavuto and Global Markets Editor Maria Bartiromo will moderate the 9 p.m. debates.

“Donald Trump doesn’t know what he’s talking about”.

The “main event” will include Donald Trump, Sen.

But the unlikely challenger is doing well in Iowa, too.

The Texas senator has largely declined to return fire, opting to brush aside questions from reporters or respond with humor.

There are signs that Trump’s onslaught is at least resonating with some voters. However, the poll also found only 46 percent of Iowans are aware of Cruz’ birth in Canada. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) broke out into the open this week, with the two presidential candidates taking their sharpest jabs yet at each other. “It seems more a matter of slippage for Cruz”. Trump has raised the issue repeatedly on the campaign trail, warning voters that it is certain to create complications and even invite lawsuits. But that was before Laurence Tribe, who was once his Harvard law professor, wrote in the Boston Globe that Cruz’s reading of the presidential eligibility clause of the Constitution was at odds with his usual originalism. “The point is, you’re not”. He served in Tallahassee from 1999 to 2007, and in those years consistently staked out positions aimed at curbing abortion- something he would do again if elected president, he said. However, Rubio is competitive in all three early states, unlike his “establishment” competitors.

But it’s not just the establishment-friendly candidates who are going after Rubio. If the nominee is Ted Cruz, the situation is still dicey.

Speaking to radio host Howie Carr, Cruz continued the attacks, subtlety raising questions about Trump’s values. After first telling the Washington Post that Rubio can’t “slime his way to the White House”, Christie later framed a Rubio-Clinton matchup as one in which the former secretary of state would “pat [Rubio] on the head and rip his heart out”.

The second will be between the remaining five candidates on the main stage as they try to muscle their way into the spotlight.

The big if is whether Trump’s supporters will show up.

In the latest CBS/New York Times national poll, Trump leads the GOP field by 17 points. Rubio, meanwhile, would defeat Clinton in a general election 48% to 45%, the survey showed. All are seeking to manage expectations ahead of the voting in New Hampshire, saying they do not necessarily have to win to stay alive in the race for the GOP nomination.

When the network cut its ties with Trump in June, it never imagined he would have the political impact that he would have, he said.

I’m not sure which case I find more persuasive.

It’s clear the Republican establishment isn’t happy with the way things have gone with Trump. Allies of Bush have also seized on Rubio’s inconsistency on immigration in a bid to rile up resentment among conservatives who were rankled by the senator’s efforts to pass a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. “We have had some previous cases of it, but I don’t think we’ve ever gone through the court system for the Supreme Court to decide one way or another”, Paul said.

Donald Trump appears on stage at the CNN Republican Presidential Debate in Simi Valley, California on September 16, 2015.

The retired neurosurgeon’s sudden surge in the polls caught many by surprise. A majority of every other candidate’s supporters said they were willing to shift their support. So it’s hard to imagine how the candidate might use Thursday’s debate to engineer an electric moment – and ward off being left for dead in the 2016 race.

Cruz replied, in part, by suggesting flames are being fanned by foes mindful that Cruz fares better against Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton in national polls than Trump.