Perry Johnson

The Republican National Committee confirmed late Monday night the presidential candidates who would face each other in Wednesday night’s debate. They are: North Dakota governor Doug Burgum, former New Jersey governor Chris Christie, Florida governor Ron DeSantis, former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley, former Arkansas governor Asa Hutchinson, former vice president Mike Pence, businessman Vivek Ramaswamy and South Carolina senator Tim Scott. Former president Donald Trump, who leads every poll comfortably, will not be in attendance. Trump had hoped to send surrogates to vouch on his behalf in the spin room — which, in an apparent tribute to Watergate, will be in the players' parking garage of the Fiserv Forum.

Des Moines, Iowa This isn’t your grandfather’s Iowa State Fair.  Iowa, once a reliably blue state, hosts an internationally renowned fair every summer that explodes in popularity during presidential cycles. This year was different. Republicans ran the show, building off their almost complete political domination of the state.  “Iowa has been trending red,” the state’s lieutenant governor, Adam Gregg, told me, laying out the stakes. “The future of our state and the future of our country is impacted by what Iowa does.” And the state fair is where it’s at. Gregg, who’s been coming here for “decades,” called the fair “ground zero” for presidential campaigns.

High-profile candidates are on track to meet the Republican National Committee’s new debate requirements for the first showdown on August 23 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The rules require that a candidate reach 1 percent support in three national polls (or two national polls and one early-primary state poll) conducted from July 1 onwards and have 40,000 individual donors, with at least 200 donors in twenty different states. Donald Trump, Ron DeSantis, Vivek Ramaswamy, Mike Pence, Tim Scott and Nikki Haley, who have all polled consistently over 1 percent in the past two polls, will likely qualify for the debate when the third is released. All but Pence have stated they have met the 40,000 donor threshold, according to Politico.