The event, staged in a hotel casino on the Las Vegas Strip, broke little new substantive ground as the candidates — facing one another for the sixth time in as many weeks — restated mostly familiar positions.
But there was a heightened degree of animus in the air, which pushed the usually unruffled Mitt Romney into a series of raised-voice, finger-jabbing confrontations, most dramatically with Texas Gov. Rick Perry.
Perry, who surged to the top of polls upon entering the race in August only to fall back after a series of poor debate performances, assumed the role of instigator in the evening's sharpest exchange. Ignoring a question about healthcare, Perry attacked Romney by noting that the former Massachusetts governor once knowingly employed a landscaping service that hired illegal immigrants. The issue surfaced in Romney's 2008 campaign for president.
"The idea that you stand here before us and talk about that you're strong on immigration is, on its face, the height of hypocrisy," Perry said to a mixture of boos and applause from the audience in a Venetian hotel ballroom.
Romney denied the assertion, and when Perry rebutted, the two men began interrupting and speaking over each other, to Romney's growing anger and frustration. "This has been a tough couple of debates for Rick and I understand that ... you're going to get testy," Romney said, as Perry glared at him.
The two resumed bickering, then Romney cut Perry off, declaring: "You have a problem with allowing someone to finish. And I suggest if you want to become president of the United States, you've got to let both people speak."
The nasty tone held to the very end. When Perry ridiculed Romney's job creation record as governor, Romney dredged up Perry's support for Democrat Al Gore's 1988 presidential campaign. (Perry at the time was a Democrat.)
"There was a fellow Texan named George Bush running, so if we're looking at the past, I think we know where you were," Romney said. Moreover, he continued, nearly half the jobs created during Perry's tenure as governor went to "illegal aliens."
"That is an absolute falsehood on its face," Perry snapped, saying that compared with his own performance, "you failed as the governor of Massachusetts."
Businessman Herman Cain, who has climbed in recent polls to tie or surpass Romney, also came under assault, with the focus on his signature proposal to scrap the federal tax code and replace it with a 9% income tax, a 9% business tax and a 9% sales tax.
Numerous independent economic analysts have suggested the so-called 9-9-9 plan would raise taxes for millions of Americans and hit hardest at the poor and middle-class.
Cain disputed that idea. "The reason that our plan is being attacked so much is because lobbyists, accountants, politicians, they don't want to throw out the current tax code and put in something that's simple and fair," said Cain, who throughout the night touted his credentials as a Washington outsider.
Perry was among those who pounced, suggesting Cain's plan would simply layer new taxes on top of existing ones. "Go to New Hampshire, where they don't have a sales tax and you're fixing to give them one," Perry said, pointedly referring to the host of the first presidential primary. "They're not interested in 9-9-9."
Members of the 1,500-strong Republican audience leaving after the debate expressed disappointment with the personal nature of the clashes. Patrick Nelson, 39, a Republican businessman who had travelled from California to be present, gave the night to Romney, saying he sounded competent while Perry continued to stumble over his words. But he thought the squabbling damaged both of them. "I did not like to see that," Nelson said.
A spokesman for Romney, speaking after the debate in the 'spin-room', accused Perry of taking "cheap shots" over immigration, saying it was an old story. The Boston Globe first reported it in 2006.
Ray Sullivan, a spokesman for Perry, insisted his candidate had had a good night, dominating the debate and showing that Romney had a "flip-flop problem".
The angriest exchanges came when Perry squared up to Romney, telling him: "You lose all of your standing, from my perspective, because you hired illegals in your home and you knew about it for a year. And the idea that you stand here before us and talk about that you're strong on immigration is on its face the height of hypocrisy."
Romney looked on with a fixed smile and initially denied he had "ever hired an illegal in my life" and challenged Perry to produce facts. But later he said a company he had hired to mow his lawn had illegal immigrants and when that was pointed out to him, he let them go.
Romney demonstrated his irritation, at one point accusing Perry of being "testy" because he had done badly in earlier debates.
Perry returned to the issue later, saying Romney was a magnet for illegal immigrants looking for work. The audience, strongly pro-Romney, booed him.
On the issue of Romney's Mormonism, raised by an ally of Perry's two weeks ago when he dismissed it as a 'cult', Perry said he had not agreed with the pastor who brought it up.
"I didn't agree with it, Mitt, and I said so," Perry said. Romney said he accepted that.
Perry also hit out at Cain, telling him his tax plan - 9% income tax, 9% corporate income tax and 9% sales tax - would not fly. Earlier today, the non-partisan Tax Policy Centre said Cain's plans would mean tax rises for 84% of the population. Cain denied it, saying the candidates were confusing apples with oranges, but failed to explain the distinction.
This was the eighth presidential debate this year, with the next not scheduled until next month.
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