Biden maintains grip on 2020 Democratic race after third debate
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[September 13, 2019]
By James Oliphant
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Those expecting Joe Biden's
presidential candidacy to flame out any day now will have to keep
waiting.
The former U.S. vice president survived another Democratic debate on
Thursday largely unbloodied and unbowed, leaving those on the margins of
the race for the party’s 2020 nomination wondering if their time to gain
ground on the front-runner is running out.
If anything, the third Democratic debate in Houston was notable for how
few of the nine other candidates took hard swings at Biden, a marked
contrast from earlier debates when his record was more directly
challenged.
The evening likely left the race fairly much as it was before the
debate, with Biden holding a sizeable, but not overwhelming lead over
U.S. Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.
None of the other 17 Democratic presidential candidates seeking the
chance to battle Republican President Donald Trump in the November 2020
election have more than 4% support, according to the latest Reuters/Ipsos
poll released on Wednesday.
Biden seemed more vulnerable than ever coming into the debate, facing
persistent questions about his age, verbal slip-ups and performance on
the campaign trail.
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But on Thursday, his resilience and forceful defense of his record as a
U.S. senator and No. 2 to former President Barack Obama left wide open
the question of who else in the field might rise to shake up the race.
“Most had a decent night, but the front-runners are still the
front-runners,” said Leah Daughtry, a Democratic strategist in South
Carolina, a critical early voting state in next year’s nominating
contests.
FEW FIREWORKS
It was the first time Warren was on a debate stage with Biden and the
matchup between the old-school Democratic centrist and the spirited
progressive senator from Massachusetts was widely anticipated.
Yet it produced no fireworks, as Warren stuck to her pattern of not
criticizing other Democrats.
More fortunate for the 76-year-old Biden: Aside from a few slips of the
tongue, he provided little ammunition for those who argue he is too old
or too out of step to be the party’s nominee.
Rather, most of the candidates stressed party unity and worried aloud
about not appearing divided in front of the American people, a shift
from earlier debates where intraparty conflict was the story.
When Biden’s rivals on stage did go on the attack, their attempts
largely backfired. Most notable was a guided missile fired by Julian
Castro, the U.S. housing secretary under Obama, who worked hard to
portray Biden as past his prime.
Castro, 44, alleged Biden was "forgetting” something he had said a few
minutes earlier and then followed it up by charging that he, not Biden,
was the better steward of Obama’s legacy, resulting in audible gasps
from the large crowd in attendance.
As it turned out, Castro was incorrect about what Biden had said
earlier.
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![](../images/091319pics/news_a1.jpg)
Former Vice President Joe Biden speaks during the 2020 Democratic
U.S. presidential debate in Houston, Texas, U.S. September 12, 2019.
REUTERS/Mike Blake
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Biden's advisers criticized Castro for what they called a "cheap
shot" and argued that Castro had not learned the lesson of the first
two debates - attacking Biden does not pay off.
“Castro went too far, tone-wise,” said Delacey Skinner, a Democratic
strategist in Washington who is unaffiliated with a campaign. “The
jab at Biden's age was cringeworthy.”
Even U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, a candidate on stage
with Biden, told ABC News afterward that Castro’s attack was “so
personal and so unnecessary."
Asked afterward about the charge he had taken a cheap shot, Castro
told MSNBC: "I completely disagree," and said he was not suggesting
Biden was too old but seeking to highlight their policy differences
on healthcare.
Biden was helped as well by several candidates paying homage to
Obama’s record, which reinforced Biden’s long-standing argument that
he is best positioned to build on the former president’s
achievements and reverse Trump’s policies.
Biden himself seized on Obama’s popularity with Democrats early on,
by suggesting that Warren lined up with Sanders, a self-described
socialist, on policy issues, while he mirrored Obama.
In doing so, Biden drew a sharp distinction between himself and his
two closest challengers. “The senator says she's for Bernie,” Biden
said. “Well, I'm for Barack.”
Skinner said another candidate who probably helped himself the most
on Thursday was Beto O’Rourke, the former Texas congressman who has
refashioned his campaign persona in the aftermath of last month’s
shootings in his hometown of El Paso that killed 22.
O’Rourke, who has made gun control his animating issue, vowed
unequivocally to call for an assault weapons ban if elected
president in a statement that quickly went viral on social media.
“I think he'll generate some buzz out of this performance,” Skinner
said. “The question will be whether or not he can capitalize on it
and sustain it.”
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The good news for the lesser candidates on the stage on Thursday is
that all of them have already qualified for the October debate,
where they will be joined by at least one other contender.
That should ensure the debates will again be split into two
evenings, but this time in smaller groups, which may give the
candidates more time to make their case to an electorate that, to
date, has largely ignored them.
(Reporting by James Oliphant; Additional reporting by Joseph Ax in
Houston; Editing by Soyoung Kim and Peter Cooney)
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