Takeaways: Elizabeth Warren under fire, 70s club ignores the age issue
A dozen democratic presidential candidates participated in a spirited debate over health care, taxes, gun control and impeachment. Takeaways from the three-hour forum in Westerville, Ohio: WARREN’S RISE ATTRACTS ATTACKS Sen. Elizabeth Warren found Tuesday that her rise in the polls may come with a steep cost. She’s now a clear target for attacks, particularly from more moderate challengers, and her many plans are now being subjected to much sharper scrutiny. Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar and South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg slammed her for not acknowledging, as Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders has, that middle-class taxes would increase under the single-payer health plan she and Sanders favor. “At least Bernie’s being honest with this,” Klobuchar said. “I don’t think the American people are wrong when they say what they want is a choice,” Buttigieg told Warren. His plan maintains private insurance but would allow people to buy into Medicare. Candidates also pounced on Warren’s suggestion that only she and Sanders want to take on billionaires while the rest of the field wants to protect them. Former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke told Warren it didn’t seem as though she wanted to lift people up and she is “more focused on being punitive.” And they piled onto her signature proposal, a 2 percent wealth tax to raise the trillions of dollars needed for many of her ambitious proposals. Technology entrepreneur Andrew Yang noted that such a measure has failed in almost every European country where it’s been tried. Sen. Kamala Harris of California even went after Warren for not backing Harris’ call for Twitter to ban President Donald Trump. THAT 70s SHOW The stage included three 70-something candidates who would be the oldest people ever elected to a first term as president — including 78-year-old Sanders, who had a heart attack this month. Moderators asked all three how they could do the job. None really addressed the question. Sanders invited the public to a major rally he’s planning in New York City next week and vowed to take the fight to corporate elites. Biden promised to release his medical records before the Iowa caucuses next year and said he was running because the country needs an elder statesman in the White House after Trump. Warren, whose campaign has highlighted her hours-long sessions posing for selfies with supporters, promised to “out-organize and outlast” any other candidate, including Trump. Then she pivoted to her campaign argument that Democrats need to put forth big ideas rather than return to the past, a dig at Biden. ONE VOICE ON IMPEACHMENT The opening question was a batting practice fastball for the Democratic candidates: Should Trump be impeached? They were in steadfast agreement. All 12 of them. Largely with variations on the word “corrupt” to describe the Republican president. Warren was asked first if voters should decide whether Trump should stay in office. She responded, “There are decisions that are bigger than politics.” Biden, who followed Sanders, offered a rare admission: “I agree with Bernie.” The only hint of dissonance came from Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii, who was one of the last Democratic House members to back an impeachment inquiry. She lamented that some Democrats had been calling for Trump’s impeachment since right after the 2016 election, undermining the party’s case against him. KLOBUCHAR: MINNESOTA NOT-SO-NICE Klobuchar has faded into the background in previous debates, but she stood out on the crowded stage. She also went on the attack. She chided Yang for seeming to compare Russian interference in the 2016 election to U.S. foreign policy. But her main barbs were reserved for Warren. “I appreciate Elizabeth’s work but, again, the difference between a plan and a pipe dream is something you can actually get done,” she said. After Warren seemed to suggest other candidates were protecting billionaires, Klobuchar pounced. “No one on this stage wants to protect billionaires,” Klobuchar said. “Even the billionaire doesn’t want to protect billionaires.” That was a reference to investor Tom Steyer, who had agreed with Sanders’ condemnation of billionaires and called for a wealth tax — despite the fact that his wealth funded his last-minute campaign to clear the debate thresholds and appear Tuesday night. Klobuchar also forcefully condemned Trump’s abandonment of the Kurds in Syria. BOOKER THE PEACEMAKER New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker has been trying to campaign on the power of love and unity. It hasn’t vaulted him to the top of the polls, but it drew perhaps the biggest cheers from the crowd Tuesday night. As candidates bickered over their tax plans, Booker shut it down. “We’ve got one shot to make Donald Trump a one-term president and how we talk about each other in this debate actually really matters,” he said. “Tearing each other down because we have a different plan is unacceptable.” Later, as candidates tussled over foreign policy and Syria, Booker again tried to bring the debate back to morals. “This president is turning the moral leadership of this country into a dumpster fire,” he said, before launching into a furious condemnation of Trump’s foreign policy. The New Jersey senator’s inability to break out of the pack has puzzled Democrats who long saw him as a top-tier presidential candidate. By Nicholas Riccardi Associated Press Republished with the permission of the Associated Press.
U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell ends presidential bid, will seek reelection
Rep. Eric Swalwell on Monday became the first candidate in the crowded 2020 Democratic presidential primary to exit the campaign, saying he would run for reelection to his California congressional seat next year. Swalwell, 38, announced his exit in his home district, describing his decision as “the beginning of an opportunity in Congress with a new perspective” influenced by his 3-month-long presidential bid. The four-term congressman’s White House effort never progressed significantly with voters, a fact Swalwell acknowledged on Monday in saying that “polls have had their way” in determining his viability. He had signaled before departing the race that he would consider bowing out if he was in danger of missing the cutoff for the next nationally televised Democratic debate, which is based on separate polling and donor qualifications. Montana Gov. Steve Bullock missed the threshold for last month’s debate but was ahead of Swalwell in the competition for this month’s televised Democratic faceoff. Asked about whether other candidates with similarly lackluster success so far in the packed Democratic primary should also consider dropping out, Swalwell demurred, describing the abandonment of a campaign as “really a personal decision.” He also declined to indicate which of his onetime presidential rivals he might endorse in the primary and said he had not planned to seek the presidency as “a vanity project” or “to write a book.” As Swalwell prepares to seek another term in Congress, he said that he would not “take anything for granted.” Indeed, he already has a challenger in his liberal-leaning district: Democrat Aisha Wahab, a city councilwoman in Hayward. But Swalwell is viewed as a rising star in the House Democratic majority, with Speaker Nancy Pelosi lauding him during an appearance in San Francisco on Monday. “He had a message of national security and gun safety that he wanted to convey to the country and he did that,” Pelosi told reporters. By Elana Schor Associated Press. Associated Press writer Samantha Maldonado in San Francisco contributed to this report. Republished with the permission of the Associated Press.
Lincoln Chafee ends his presidential campaign
Former Rhode Island Gov. Lincoln Chafee announced Friday he would end his quixotic Democratic presidential campaign after failing to gain traction against Hillary Rodham Clinton and Bernie Sanders. “After much thought I have decided to end my campaign for president today,” Chafee said at a women’s forum held by the Democratic National Committee. “But I would like to take this opportunity one last time to advocate for a chance be given to peace.” Chafee delivered a widely panned debate performance earlier this month and has struggled to raise money and generate enthusiasm in a field that has been dominated by Clinton, a former secretary of state, and Sanders, the Vermont independent senator. Chafee’s departure comes days after Vice President Joe Biden declined to join the field and former Virginia Sen. Jim Webb announced he was leaving the Democratic campaign and would consider an independent bid. It leaves Clinton, Sanders and former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley as the three main contenders for the nomination. All three are appearing Saturday at a major Iowa Democratic fundraising dinner in Des Moines, an event that helped fuel President Barack Obama‘s rise in the fall of 2007. The former Rhode Island senator surprised many when he formed a presidential exploratory committee last spring and raised eyebrows when he called for the U.S. to switch to the metric system during a formal campaign kickoff in Virginia last June. His poll numbers were so low that comedian Conan O’Brien came up with a song for Chafee’s longshot bid and encouraged viewers to boost his poll numbers from 0 percent to 1 percent because “it seems like the nice thing to do.” Often driving from his Rhode Island home, Chafee visited the first primary state of New Hampshire several times but failed to draw large crowds. In the first Democratic debate, Chafee referred to himself as a “block of granite” when it came to issues and said he was most proud of his judgment, particularly his vote against the Iraq war. He frequently said U.S. foreign policy should promote peace but his performance was widely panned, prompting questions about whether he would continue his campaign. Chafee raised just $11,000 in the most recent fundraising quarter. Most of his money has come from more than $360,000 that he has loaned his campaign. During his past campaigns, he relied on an old New England family fortune amassed over generations. Chafee told reporters he decided to end his campaign last weekend after Clinton’s strong performance in the debate. Biden’s announcement and Clinton’s testimony before the House Select Committee on Benghazi reaffirmed his thinking, Chafee said, adding he no longer saw her use of a private email system as a disqualifying issue. “Obviously it’s a good week for Secretary Clinton,” he said. “I’m moving on now. It’s time to move on and support the party any way I can.” The presidential bid represented an unusual twist for the unconventional 62-year-old lawmaker and the son of late Sen. John Chafee. In the Senate, the younger Chafee stood out as a liberal Republican in an increasingly conservative party. He was the lone Republican in 2002 to vote against going to war in Iraq, a moment that he tried to make a cornerstone of his campaign. He was elected governor in 2010 as an independent and twice backed Obama’s White House campaigns. He joined the Democrats in 2013 and used his presidential campaign to urge the U.S. to help reinvigorate the United Nations as a way to promote peace and stability. DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a Florida congresswoman, called Chafee a “class act” and recalled his decision to join the Democratic party. “Let’s remember that that was a big deal,” Wasserman Schultz told the audience. “Because when he joined our party, he made clear that his former party had left him.” Republished with permission of the Associated Press.
