Republican presidential candidates clash with personal attacks in debate

Nikki Haley, Vivek Ramaswamy, Chris Christie and Ron DeSantis make case to be alternative to Donald Trump

• Swings, misses but no clear winner: five takeaways from the fourth Republican debate

The fourth Republican presidential debate opened and closed with deeply personal clashes as the four candidates onstage pressed their case to be the viable alternative to Donald Trump, the far-and-away frontrunner who again declined to participate.

Smoldering rivalries burst into the open early into Wednesday night's debate, with Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida, turning on Nikki Haley, a former governor of South Carolina and former United Nations ambassador, as she catches him in the increasingly combative scrap for second place.