The 5th Democratic Debate In 100 Words (And A Video)

It also revealed that the two remaining Democratic candidates for the presidential nomination are still inadequately facing up to two important sets of questions for any would-be president. “Bernie Sanders closes a 31-point gap to tie Secretary Hillary Clinton”, Tim Malloy, the assistant director of the Quinnipiac poll, said in a statement released with the polling data.

“I don’t think voters are interested in the transcripts of her speeches”, Clinton strategist Joel Benenson said at a Wall Street Journal breakfast on Friday.

Rachel Maddow embraces both Clinton and Sanders at end of debate.

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made a strong case for her electability, one point where she can seriously differentiate herself from Bernie Sanders.

Dean said in defense of Clinton that when she gave the speeches shortly after leaving the State Department she had not committed to running for president.

“I am very proud to be the only candidate up here… who’s not raising huge sums from Wall Street and special interests”, he said.

Some of their sharpest exchanges were on campaign financing, with Mrs Clinton accusing her rival of seeking unfairly to discredit her by suggesting she was beholden to powerful donors. “If either one of you is nominated as the Democratic Party’s nominee, you will likely face a Republican opponent in the general election who wants to privatize or even abolish big parts of the VA. It’s a newly popular idea in conservative politics”, MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow said. That was after Clinton’s campaign manager referred to New Hampshire as Sanders’ “backyard”.

While the contest between Clinton and Sanders has grown more heated in recent weeks, Thursday’s debate took the rancor to a new level.

“Let’s ask why it is that we pay, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs, and your medicine can be doubled tomorrow, and there’s nothing the government can do to stop it”, Sanders said. Mr Sanders holds a big lead in polls in New Hampshire, which borders the state where he is a senator, Vermont.

He then took aim at Sanders’ frequent campaign stump claim that he does not receive money from super PACs, which have become a target of progressives who support campaign finance reform.

The poll, which was conducted in the two days after Monday’s Iowa caucuses, found that 44 percent of Democratic voters support Clinton and 42 percent said they back Vermont’s independent senator. Jeb Bush, his campaign lagging, brought in his mom, former first lady Barbara Bush, who praised him as “decent and honest and everything we need in a president”.