What Went Down At The January Democratic Debate

It’s been a tough night for Steyer. He’s had a couple of fairly sharp answers, but foreign policy has dominated the debate so far and that’s decidedly not an issue where he has a competitive edge. He also got completely left out of that last exchange on gender and electability.

A mid-debate checkin with Sanders, who I’m following tonight. I guess this is his first “front-runner” debate turn and he’s doing … fine? The “can a woman be president” answer was always going to be awkward, but I think he did a decent job executing his attacks on the Iraq War vote, etc.

None of the candidates, at least on stage, wanted to say the obvious: It’s not clear that Warren and her liberalism are similar to say, Klobuchar, or some of the women who won in swing districts in 2018. I will be curious if Warren’s opponents or surrogates take on this issue post-debate, particularly the male candidates’ female surrogates.