2024 CNN Town Hall: on Homeland Security

Mike Pence: We need a president to build a military fitted to the times

Ron DeSantis: I'll advocate for military service; get more signing up

Nikki Haley: Don't give cash to friends or foe; you can't follow it

HALEY: Great win for the Taiwanese election. And it happened on the heels of China doing incredible amounts of intimidation with drone tactics, with trying to spread misinformation. So it really was a win for freedom and democracy. A setback for China for sure.

Q: [Should we help Taiwan with troops, or just money and supplies like in Ukraine?]

HALEY: I don't think that we should ever give cash to any country, friend or foe, because you can't follow it, you can't hold it accountable. Really important. The second thing is we don't need to put troops on the ground anywhere. As the spouse of a military combat veteran, you don't ever want to see your loved ones go to war. But what you do have to do is deter it. There's a reason the Taiwanese want the U.S. and the West to support Ukraine. Because they know if Ukraine wins, China won't invade Taiwan.

Ron DeSantis: Veterans issues on front burner, but outside the VA

DeSANTIS: 9/11 happened. We were in conflict. And I felt that I should raise my hand and serve. I volunteered to go to Iraq. And I learned a lot about what veterans go through. And I'm going to put veteran issues on the front burner as commander-in-chief.

Q: What do you plan to do about the lackluster performance of the Veterans Administration?

DeSANTIS: What we're going to do is recognize that the V.A. is a massive bureaucracy. I'm going to fire people that aren't doing a good job. We're going to bring accountability. But we're also going to harness all the resources that are outside of government. And this is a model we've used in Florida. And we're going to use it for veterans. So we have something called the CarePortal. We recruit military groups, charities, churches, businesses, individuals. So you go to the V.A., you need something, maybe the V.A. helps you, but that immediately goes out to all these organizations.