Democratic White House hopefuls on Tuesday rounded on the party’s leftist frontrunner, US Senator Bernie Sanders, during a feisty debate, attacking him as too extreme for US voters and a flawed challenger to US President Donald Trump.
Former US vice president Joe Biden, who needs a victory in South Carolina’s crucial primary on Saturday to keep his campaign alive, hit Sanders as soft on gun control, while billionaire former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg claimed Russia was working to help Sanders win the nomination — betting he would be defeated in November.
Sanders’ rivals joined forces in savaging the self-described democratic socialist as too radical to appeal to a broad swathe of Americans.
Photo: AFP
US Senator Elizabeth Warren, former South Bend, Indiana, mayor Pete Buttigieg and US Senator Amy Klobuchar, all desperate to halt Sanders’ momentum before it is too late, laid into his ability to deliver on costly programs such as universal health care and tuition-free college.
Buttigieg, a 38-year-old military veteran presenting himself as a unifier, warned a Sanders fight against Trump would spell “chaos” and divide the nation.
“I tell you what it adds up to. It ends up as four more years of Donald Trump,” Buttigieg said.
Sanders is in pole position in South Carolina, the last step before Super Tuesday next week when 14 states vote and a whopping one-third of all delegates — the representatives who pick the nominee at the Democratic Party’s July convention — are up for grabs.
The 78-year-old hit back at the charge his policies were too “radical,” insisting such ideas “exist in countries all over the world,” including the notion that health care is a human right.
“The way we beat Trump, which is what everybody up here wants, is we need a campaign of energy and excitement,” Sanders said. “We need to bring working people back into the Democratic Party.”
Talking over one another in often contentious exchanges, the seven candidates aggressively vied for attention, locking horns on everything from housing to China policy, and whether to move the US embassy from Jerusalem back to Tel Aviv.
Seeking to prove he is still in the fight, Biden put in a spirited performance and snapped back at moderators who tried to cut him off, telling them: “I’m not going to be quiet anymore, OK?”
He aimed a sharp attack at Sanders over gun control, an issue largely absent from previous debates, and a significant weakness for the Vermont senator who voted against legislation that would have allowed lawsuits against gun manufacturers.
Bloomberg sought to cast a Sanders nomination as a sure path to losing.
“[Russian President] Vladimir Putin thinks that Donald Trump should be president of the United States, and that’s why Russia is helping you get elected so you’ll lose to him,” he told Sanders in a heated opening exchange.
Sanders had emerged largely unscathed from the previous debate, but he acknowledged he was in the firing line, with rivals seeking to derail his push for the nomination following two straight victories, in New Hampshire and then Nevada.
“I’m hearing my name mentioned a little bit tonight,” he said to laughter. “I wonder why.”
FIVE-YEAR WINDOW? A defense institute CEO said a timeline for a potential Chinese invasion was based on expected ‘tough measures’ when Xi Jinping seeks a new term Most Taiwanese are willing to defend the nation against a Chinese attack, but the majority believe Beijing is unlikely to invade within the next five years, a poll showed yesterday. The poll carried out last month was commissioned by the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, a Taipei-based think tank, and released ahead of Double Ten National Day today, when President William Lai (賴清德) is to deliver a speech. China maintains a near-daily military presence around Taiwan and has held three rounds of war games in the past two years. CIA Director William Burns last year said that Chinese President Xi Jinping
President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday said that China has “no right to represent Taiwan,” but stressed that the nation was willing to work with Beijing on issues of mutual interest. “The Republic of China has already put down roots in Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu,” Lai said in his first Double Ten National Day address outside the Presidential Office Building in Taipei. “And the Republic of China and the People’s Republic of China [PRC] are not subordinate to each other.” “The People’s Republic of China has no right to represent Taiwan,” he said at the event marking the 113th National Day of
SPEECH IMPEDIMENT? The state department said that using routine celebrations or public remarks as a pretext for provocation would undermine peace and stability Beijing’s expected use of President William Lai’s (賴清德) Double Ten National Day speech today as a pretext for provocative measures would undermine peace and stability, the US Department of State said on Tuesday. Taiwanese officials have said that China is likely to launch military drills near Taiwan in response to Lai’s speech as a pretext to pressure the nation to accept its sovereignty claims. A state department spokesperson said it could not speculate on what China would or would not do. “However, it is worth emphasizing that using routine annual celebrations or public remarks as a pretext or excuse for provocative or coercive
CONCERNS: Allowing the government, political parties or the military to own up to 10 percent of a large media firm is a risk Taiwan cannot afford to take, a lawyer said A Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator has proposed amendments to allow the government, political parties and the military to indirectly invest in broadcast media, prompting concerns of potential political interference. Under Article 1 of the Satellite Broadcasting Act (衛星廣播電視法), the government and political parties — as well as foundations established with their endowments, and those commissioned by them — cannot directly or indirectly invest in satellite broadcasting businesses. A similar regulation is in the Cable Radio and Television Act (有線廣播電視法). “The purpose of banning the government, political parties and the military from investing in the media is to prevent them from interfering
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