CNN panel struggles to spin something positive out of Kelly Loeffler's 'robotic' debate performance

If there's one thing the CNN panelist agreed on Sunday after the Georgia Senate debate, it was that Sen. Kelly Loeffler lost.

From Atlanta, Georgia, CNN correspondent Ryan Nobles explained that the "most glaring" example of a debate dodge was Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-GA) refusing to answer whether she agreed that the election was rigged.

"Anybody that watched this will be left with is the fact that when she was asked directly, at least five, six, maybe seven times, whether or not she agrees that President Donald Trump lost the presidential election, Kelly Loeffler just refused to answer that question," said Nobles. "She would then move on to the stock answer that she had related to dancing around this issue of election discrepancies and fraud and that it needs to be looked into, and the president has every right to look into it. She was asked by almost every person involved in moderating this debate directly, did president trump win or lose, and she just did not answer the question. I think that more than anything reflects this tightrope the republican candidates are walking here in Georgia. They don't necessarily -- it's not necessarily good for them to engage fully in the conspiracy theories and the baseless claims that President Trump is making about this election. but at the same time, they cannot alienate Trump voters. We saw Kelly Loeffler at least attempt to dance on that tightrope tonight."

CNN politics reporter Chris Cillizza said that at the very least, Rev. Warnock "tried to answer the questions." By contrast, Loeffler did an excellent job repeating her talking points whether they made sense in that context or not.

"Now, that can work, particularly if your strategy is to remind the base of the Republican Party what they are afraid of as it connects to Warnock. I don't want to say she lost," said Cillizza. "In terms of a pure debate, Rafael Warnock was better. He wanted to present himself as, 'I'm not a scary national liberal.' I'm a preacher."

Loeffler, he said, had a different mission. "Totally nationalized the race. Make the race about Nancy Pelosi. 'But this is a takeover of socialism. It's on the march. The only way that you can stop it is by voting for Kelly Loeffler.' She didn't talk about what she did for the state other than say, 'I have Georgia on my mind at all times.'"

Wolf Blitzer agreed with Cillizza that Loeffler "repeated and repeated those claims over and over again."

CNN national political reporter Maeve Reston said that Loeffler "sounded a bit robotic" in her answers by "sort of repeating the same phrases." It was a take that went viral on Twitter during the debate.

CNN senior political analyst disputed assessment from Reston, calling it, "that's about most robotic appearance as you're ever going to see in a debate."

Watch the discussion in the video below: