Second Democratic Primary Debate: Responses from across the web to night one | Opinion
What did viewers think of the first night of the second Democratic presidential debate?
On Tuesday, 20 Democrats vying for the nomination gathered for the first night of their’s party’s second primary debate, hosted by CNN. The second half takes stage tonight.
Last night’s candidates, including Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Sen. Bernie Sanders, Mayor Pete Buttigieg, Marianne Williamson, and Rep. Beto O’Rourke, faced off for three hours on topics such as civil rights, foreign policy, healthcare, gun violence, immigration, and climate change.
Cartoonists, the internet, and the commentary press were quick in responding to the candidates and takeaways of the debate. We aggregated some of these voices.
The big three?
One cartoonist depicted Sanders, Warren, and Buttigieg as the most important speakers of the debate.
The Medicare-For-All wars
Sanders staunchly defended his proposal for Medicare-for-all. When Ohio congressman Tim Ryan criticized this idea by questioning whether Sanders knew that this plan would be comprehensive, Sanders bluntly responded: “I wrote the damn bill!”
The audience reacted via Twitter to this face-off:
Claims of ‘impossible promises’
Warren also debated in favor of Medicare-For-All and captured the audience’s attention through her response to Maryland Rep. John Delaney’s argument that the Democratic party should not make “impossible promises." Her reaction: “I don’t understand why anybody goes to the trouble of running for president of the United States just to talk about what we really can’t do and shouldn’t fight for."
Warren’s response prompted the audience to react via Twitter.
Other big candidate moments
Meanwhile, Buttigieg called out the current political system of the United States and urged for structural reforms to take place. He also expressed how, if elected president, he will remove all American troops from Afghanistan during his first year in office. His message inspired a cartoon from Ann Telnaes:
Williamson explained that reparations in the United States is a payment of debt to African Americans and provided specifics on how this should take place. She also addressed the Flint Water Crisis in Flint, Michigan, when debating about race in America.
The audience reacted to her discussion of the Flint water crisis and reparations:
Sen. Amy Klobuchar and O’Rourke spoke for a total of about 10 minutes during the debate, according to a count by the New York Times. Vox argued that O’Rourke did not have a a standout moment, and Klobuchar was unclear during the debate, according to Ed Rogers of the Washington Post.
Cartoonists and the Twitter audience also reacted to their performance during the debate:
Repetition from candidates
But to one cartoonist, the candidates largely sounded the same as they scrambled to stand out from the pack.