She questioned about the prevalence of detest crimes versus L.G.B.T.Q. Individuals, pressed candidates on their earlier anti-immigration remarks and waded into a dispute in Florida above community school training specifications that advised slaves had “developed techniques which, in some cases, could be applied for their private gain.”
Ilia Calderón, just one of the 3 moderators of Wednesday’s Republican presidential key discussion, may well not have been common to some viewers who tuned in to the Fox Information and Fox Business enterprise channels. But her queries appeared to catch some candidates off-guard and touched on viewpoints that are not routinely expressed by leading Republican politicians or Fox’s conservative key-time hosts.
Ms. Calderón, 51, is a co-anchor of the nightly newscast of Univision, which co-hosted the debate with Fox Information Media and broadcast the proceedings in Spanish. Univision producers retained editorial regulate over Ms. Calderón’s concerns.
Early on, she pointed out that Ronald Reagan, whose presidential library hosted the celebration, experienced granted amnesty to nearly a few million immigrants, and pressed previous Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey on a quip he made in 2015 about tracking immigrants the way FedEx tracks offers. (“What we have to do now is first handle this like the regulation enforcement trouble it is,” Mr. Christie replied, with no commenting on the FedEx remark.)
Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida disputed Ms. Calderón’s concern about his state’s new African American historical past requirements, contacting her premise a hoax “perpetrated by Kamala Harris.” (In fact, the quotation was drawn specifically from the specifications.) The issue led to one of the far more unforgettable times of the evening: Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, the only Black candidate onstage, jumped in to declare, “There is not a redeeming excellent in slavery,” drawing sustained applause from the audience.
Some conservatives observing along took umbrage. “Another weird problem,” a reporter for the conservative Day by day Sign wrote on X, previously identified as Twitter, right after Ms. Calderón asked previous Vice President Mike Pence about violent hate crimes against L.G.B.T.Q. individuals.
Far more generally than not, the candidates did not right reply to Ms. Calderón’s inquiries. And many situations, Ms. Calderón — along with her fellow moderators, Dana Perino of Fox News and Stuart Varney of Fox Enterprise — ran into hassle retaining purchase. The candidates consistently interrupted inquiries and spoke above 1 one more, with Ms. Perino pressured to challenge a stern reminder of the principles.
“We’re heading to have to lower your mic, and I really do not want to do that,” she warned at one particular stage, which led to some settling down.
Ms. Calderón was born in Colombia and begun her job as a broadcaster in Medellín. She joined Telemundo in 2001 and grew to become a co-host of Univision’s night news software in 2017. She also moderated a Democratic primary discussion in March 2020, presiding along with CNN’s Dana Bash and Jake Tapper in excess of the final conference amongst Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont.