Biden, Warren seek New Hampshire boost in TV town halls
February 5, 2020MANCHESTER, N.H. — Joe Biden's eleventh-hour pitch to New Hampshire voters is that he has the experience as a former vice president to steady the ship after President Donald Trump leaves office.
But Elizabeth Warren wants voters to expand their idea who can be president, and that "we can and should have a woman for president."
"At the end of the day, when people start picking who they want for president, it's got to be someone they trust," Warren said. "Not someone who looks like what presidents looked like in the past. Sometimes we've got to think differently."
Biden and Warren made the comments during back-to-back town halls at Saint Anselm College. The network is airing hour-long town halls featuring a number of the Democratic candidates over two nights. Biden, Warren, Andrew Yang and Tom Steyer went Wednesday.
With the New Hampshire primary less than a week away, the 2020 Democratic presidential candidates are in the final stretch of their campaigns. The Iowa Democratic Party took days to release the results of the Iowa caucuses after a precinct reporting snafu, adding a sense of urgency to the New Hampshire contest.
During the wide-ranging town halls, Warren and Biden touched on issues including gun violence and escalating tensions with Iran, among other topics.
Warren highlighted her push to root out corruption in Washington, a point she often makes on the campaign trail. She pointed to the NRA and the gun industry as examples of that corruption, and laid out a plan to reduce gun violence in the United States that would span two terms.
"While I'm president, give me eight years on this, I want to reduce death by gun violence by 80 percent," Warren said. "2020 is about its about who government works for … We take this government back we make it work for everyone."
During his hour, Biden pitched himself as an experienced alternative to Trump, touting relationships he built with world leaders during his time as vice president.
"The president is using NATO as a protection racket," Biden said. "We are losing the ability to lead the world for our own safety's sake."
While Biden contrasted himself with Trump during the hour-long town hall, he spent much of his day on the campaign trail Wednesday outlining the differences between himself another rival: Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Ind., who currently has a slim state delegate lead in Iowa with most of the vote counted.
Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Ind., won the most delegates in the Iowa caucus on Monday. Biden came in fourth place, a disappointing finish for the former vice president who had led in polls for months leading up to the caucus.
"Mayor Pete likes to call me part of the old failed Washington. Was it a failure when I helped pass Obamacare, the Paris Agreement, the Violence Against Women Act, or the assault weapons ban?" Biden wrote on Twitter. "I have a stronger record of passing big, progressive legislation than anyone running."
Asked what qualities he would look for in a vice president, Biden said it would be "wonderful" to have a woman or a person of color as the vice president. The former vice president then pivoted to his experience as President Barack Obama's second-in-command.
"The most important thing I've learned from my relationship with Barack," Biden said. "No president in the 21st century can handle the job all by himself. So you've got to be prepared to turn over significant responsibility, as the president did to me, on a whole range of issues."
"He gave me presidential authority," Biden added, listing projects he helmed during the Obama administration.
Biden also slammed Trump for awarding the Presidential Medal of Freedom to conservative radio personality Rush Limbaugh, who has a history of making racist comments toward people of color, including President Barack Obama. Limbaugh is suffering from advanced lung cancer.
"Look, Rush Limbaugh has spent his entire time on the air dividing people, belittling people, talking about blacks in ways — African Americans in ways," Biden said. "Anyway, I do feel badly that he’s suffering from a terminal illness. ... But the idea that at the State of the Union he’s getting the highest honor that can be given to a civilian, I find that’s driven more by trying to keep your right-wing political credentials than anything else."
Source: https://www.politico.com/