Biden is target for most of field in Dem debate
Former Vice President Joe Biden was the only real topic in Wednesday’s Democratic presidential primary debate as the current frontrunner fought off attacks from the other candidates on a wide range of issues.
While moderators of the Detroit debate brought up topics like health care, immigration, criminal justice and racial justice, the responses were more about Biden than they were about the issues.
“Tonight, I think Democrats are expecting some engagement here,” Biden said in his opening remarks for the 2 1/2hour debate. “And I expect we’ll get it.” He wasn’t wrong. A lengthy discussion about health care, for example, became almost a twoperson dispute between Biden and California Sen. Kamala Harris over their competing plans.
“You do nothing to hold the insurance companies to task for what they are doing to American families,” Harris charged. “It is immoral. It is untenable.”
But unlike the June debate, when Biden seemed surprised at the attacks from Harris and New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, the former vice president was ready to fight back.
“If you noticed, there is no talk about the fact that the plan in 10 years will cost $3 trillion (a year),” he said, referring to Harris’ plan for health care for all. “And to be very blunt and to be very straightforward, you can’t beat President Trump with double talk on this plan.”
In a discussion on criminal justice, Booker slammed Biden for his support during his decades in the Senate of crime bills that put more people in prison.
“There are people right now in prison for life for drug offenses because you stood up and used that ‘tough on crime’ phony rhetoric that got a lot of people elected but destroyed communities like mine,” said the former Newark mayor. “This isn’t about the past, sir. This is about right now.”
Biden talked about his current plan, which calls for increased rehabilitation for prisoners, saying that while they are incarcerated “they should be learning to read and write and not just sit in there and learn how to be better criminals.”
But he also pushed back at Booker, saying that Booker himself had problems in Newark. Booker was mayor from 2006 to 2013.
“There was nothing done for the entire eight years he was mayor. There was nothing done to deal with the police department that was corrupt,” Biden said.
It was the same with the immigration question, only this time it was Julián Castro, former secretary of Housing and Urban Development under President Obama, targeting Biden.
When Castro called for eliminating criminal penalties for people entering the country, Biden disagreed, arguing, “if you cross the border illegally, you should be able to be sent back. It’s a crime.”
Castro, though, said that President Trump is using the criminal statute to separate families at the border.
“First of all, Mr. Vice President, it looks like one of us has learned the lessons of the past and one of us hasn’t,” Castro said. “What we need are politicians that actually have some guts on this issue.” Again, Biden hit back. “I have guts enough to say this plan doesn’t make sense,” he answered. “When people cross the border illegally, it is illegal to do it unless they’re seeking asylum.”
But Biden backed off when he was asked if he had supported Obama’s efforts to deport a record number of undocumented immigrants.
“I was vice president. I am not the president,” he said. “I keep my recommendation to him in private.”
But the harshest criticism again came from Harris, who attacked Biden for his opposition to busing in the 1970s.
“Biden was in the United States Senate working with segregationists to oppose busing, which was the vehicle by which we would integrate America’s public schools,” she said. “Had those segregationists had their way, I would not be a member of the United States Senate, Cory Booker would not be a member of the United States Senate and Barack Obama would not have been in a position to nominate him to the title he now holds.”
Biden responded by pointing at Harris’ record as California attorney general and San Francisco district attorney, saying that while the Los Angeles and San Francisco school districts were among the most segregated in the state, Harris “brought no cases against them.” He said she also had backed away from dealing with San Francisco police officers who had abused people’s rights.
Not every candidate, including some who were on the attack against Biden, was pleased with the harsh backandforth of the debate.
“The person that’s enjoying this debate most right now is Donald Trump, as we pit Democrats against each other,” Booker said.
The need to oust Trump was about the only thing all the candidates agreed on.
“Donald Trump really has torn apart the moral fabric of this country,” said New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand.
Businessman Andrew Yang, who is running on the idea of providing a $1,000amonth “Freedom Dividend” to every adult, described himself as Trump’s complete opposite, “an Asian man who likes math.”
Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet, a former school superintendent, said that for the past three years, “we’ve been consumed by a president who frankly doesn’t give a damn about your kids or mine.”
But it was Biden, the focus of the evening’s debate, who had the sharpest words for the president.
He said that the range of candidates on the stage showed, “We are stronger and great because of this diversity, Mr. President, not in spite of it. So Mr. President, let’s get something straight: We love it. We are not leaving it. We are here to stay. And we’re certainly not going to leave it to you.”