What Went Down At The January Democratic Debate

I’m covering tonight’s debate in person from Des Moines, so when I was assigned Buttigieg as my candidate to watch, I decided to go straight to the source, driving out to Winterset, Iowa, to attend a Buttigieg town hall.

Buttigieg told the crowd there that he’s not just running to beat Trump, he wants to tackle the many problems he says will still remain on “the day the sun rises over Winterset and Donald Trump is no longer president.” Speaking in a county that gave Trump 62 percent of the vote, Buttigieg talked about how he thinks he can heal the country’s partisan divide: He spoke of “offer[ing] voters of faith a choice” and described the feelings that stirred inside him when he looks at the American flag, like the one that hung behind him. At the same time, he emphasized his “progressive” vision for the country.

I’d expect Buttigieg to keep playing to an Iowa crowd with similar themes tonight — establishing himself as a tireless fighter for even the most liberal caucusgoers while still making the argument that he can find common ground with their Republican neighbors.

However, Buttigieg’s standing may have taken a hit since the last debate, where he was at the center of many attacks, including one from Warren on his willingness to accept donations from big-dollar donors. In our polling with Ipsos, Buttigieg was the only candidate whose net favorability (favorable rating minus unfavorable rating) fell — it dropped by about 2 points.

Buttigieg isn’t polling as well in Iowa as he once was, either. Friday’s Selzer poll of the Iowa caucuses found him in third at 16 percent, which is a pretty big shift from where he was in November — solidly in the lead with 25 percent of the vote. However, our primary forecast thinks Buttigieg is still likelier to win Iowa than other states where he’s in a relatively strong position, like New Hampshire and even his home state of Indiana. Without a win in Iowa, his chances of getting the nomination would become negligible, so the stakes for him are high.

Another problem for Buttigieg that might be even more troubling is that he also still needs a good answer on how he might better appeal to black voters. According to a January Quinnipiac survey, Buttigieg is polling at just 2 percent among black voters nationwide. And here in Iowa, Black Lives Matter protesters have been following him to events to confront him over his unsatisfactory (to them) record on racial justice in South Bend.

I’m keeping an eye on Klobuchar tonight, as this may be her last chance to catch fire in a nationally televised debate. Fortunately for her, the event is in Iowa, which also happens to be the state that has long been the focal point of her primary strategy.

There’s little debate that Klobuchar must do well in Iowa — if not outright win the state — to become a top-tier contender. Klobuchar is at about 7 percent in our Iowa polling average, good for fifth place behind the four candidates who lead the national polls, so there’s at least a modicum of evidence that her Iowa-centric approach has potential. Still, she may need to have a Rick Santorum-esque surge in the final three weeks or so before the caucuses to have a shot at winning, so this debate presents an opportunity for her to alter the trajectory of the race.

The smaller number of candidates on stage tonight could help Klobuchar, though, if the December debate is anything to go by. That debate featured only seven candidates, and Klobuchar ended up getting a lot more attention than in previous debates — she actually spoke more than any other candidate. And in FiveThirtyEight’s pre- and post-debate polling with Ipsos, Klobuchar essentially tied with Yang for the largest increase in net favorability among the candidates on stage — an indication that viewers reacted positively to her performance. So with more voters likely paying attention now, a repeat of that kind of performance might give her a boost in the polls — although the December debate doesn’t seem to have produced a Klobu-surge.

In terms of strategy, in the last debate, Klobuchar took a number of shots at Buttigieg, particularly on the issue of electability. So she might pursue a similar strategy this time around in the hopes of peeling off some of Buttigieg’s moderate supporters. There’s some evidence that this strategy may have worked well for her in December, too. A Monmouth University poll of Iowa that was released Monday found that 8 percent of voters were backing Klobuchar, putting her in fifth place, while Buttigieg was in third with 17 percent support. The poll also found that Klobuchar did best among voters who say they were moderate or conservative, winning 11 percent of them. Buttigieg however, still attracted more support in that group — 15 percent — so it makes sense that Klobuchar might aim to lure some of his backers to her own camp.

Klobuchar, of course, also needs to eat into Biden’s support, as he remains in the lead among more moderate and conservative voters, earning 35 percent in that Monmouth survey. At this point, Klobuchar doesn’t exactly have much time left to wait for a Biden collapse, so she might also try to appeal to electability-minded voters who are currently backing Biden. However, I’d expect her attacks against Biden to be more measured than the ones she made against Buttigieg last time — if she doesn’t do well in Iowa, she could still be in the mix as a vice presidential pick for one of the other contenders, including Biden, so she may not want to alienate a front-runner.

All in all, Klobuchar undoubtedly remains a long shot. She has less than a 1 percent shot of winning a majority of pledged delegates, according to our forecast. And she has just a 2 percent chance of winning the most votes in Iowa. But considering this debate might be her last chance to truly break through, Klobuchar could really be one to watch tonight.

I’ll be following the candidate who came closest to not qualifying for this evening’s debate — Tom Steyer. The billionaire activist made it into the debate just under the wire last Thursday, with a Fox News poll that put him at 15 percent in South Carolina and a second Fox News poll where he hit 12 percent in Nevada. Those polls put him in an unexpectedly strong position in our polling averages for those two states, considering he’s only polling at around 2 percent in our national average. And with a much-coveted podium on a debate stage that features fewer candidates than ever, Steyer will get one more opportunity before voting begins in Iowa to make the case for why his business background — he’s made the bold claim that he understands the economy better than any of his rivals — and political activism on issues like impeachment and climate change make him a strong presidential candidate.

Voters in the early states are probably already quite familiar with Steyer, though, as he’s been busy blanketing the airwaves in Nevada, South Carolina and Iowa with ads, spending more than $26 million on TV ads alone in those three states. But Steyer has been defensive about his ad spending, arguing that it’s his message and grassroots organizing — not his money — that got him into the debate.

One thing I’ll be watching for tonight is whether any candidates attack him for the amount of money he’s spent so far. Tonight will be the first debate without any candidates of color, too, and Steyer has taken some heat from Booker (who dropped out of the race on Monday) for buying his way onto the stage. So Steyer could get some questions about whether he really earned his spot.

But Steyer’s main task this evening is actually pretty simple: He needs to deliver a strong performance and stand out from his higher-polling rivals. The trouble is that although he and his signature plaid ties have seemed more and more at home in the Democratic debates over the past few months, voters haven’t rated him especially highly. In our December post-debate poll with Ipsos, for instance, he was among the two candidates given the worst marks for performance, relative to his pre-debate favorability. He’s also lagged behind most of the other candidates in words spoken in recent debates. So tonight is all about making a positive impression — and, if he’s especially lucky, building on his recent uptick in the polls.