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Competing visions for the party were on display as moderate candidates challenged progressives ahead of New Hampshire primary
Democratic presidential candidates clashed on Friday night in a tense televised debate that was dominated by attacks against Pete Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders, the two candidates who declared victory after the Iowa caucuses.
In the week that Donald Trump was acquitted in his impeachment trial and days ahead of the New Hampshire primary, the competing visions for the Democratic party were on show as moderate candidates challenged the progressives, and those with more Washington experience called out the relative political newcomers.
Pete Buttigieg expressed confidence over the Iowa caucus results on Thursday after days of chaotic vote tallying, even as the head of the Democratic National Party called on the state to “recanvass” the votes.
Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders have remained neck-and-neck for most of the week, and the Associated Press declared on Thursday evening that the race was still too close to call.
With 100% of precincts reporting, the pair were locked in a virtual tie. Buttigieg, leading by just 1.5 state delegate equivalents, had an advantage of about .1 percentage points.
Both Pete Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders have claimed victory in Iowa, even as technical delays and reporting issues have prolonged the delay in tallying the Democratic caucus votes. Sanders has touted his raw vote tally; Buttigieg holds a narrow lead in the number of state delegate equivalents he’s amassed.
Both candidates will be speaking tonight in a CNN town hall ahead of the New Hampshire primary contest next week. Deval Patrick and Amy Klobuchar will be participating as well, answering questions from supporters and network hosts.
Buttigieg just ahead of Sanders as Iowa votes trickle in
Pelosi rips up copy of Trump State of the Union speech
Only one Republican senator likely to vote to convict Trump
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Pete Buttigieg threw everything into winning the Iowa Democratic caucuses and – with 71% of the vote in following Monday’s results debacle – his gamble may well have paid off.
If so, the former mayor of tiny South Bend, Indiana, may look back on this moment as the peak of his political career, or the start of a long, hard slog that could take him all the way to the White House.
Hello and welcome to another big day in American politics.
It’s fair to see Donald Trump is probably having a pretty good week. Last night he got 80 minutes to make his case for a second term on primetime TV with his State of the Union address, as the Democrats continued to struggle to publish results from their first primary contest on Iowa on Monday.
Bernie Sanders has questioned the move by Democratic rival Pete Buttigeig to declare victory in the Iowa caucus. The voting has been marred by a technical error that has led to a delay in releasing the results
The Democratic party in Iowa has apologised after it failed to reveal results from the Iowa caucuses. The system for reporting the votes failed to function, while a back-up telephone line also jammed, leading to no declaration of a winner despite the campaign moving on to New Hampshire
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Some Iowans expressed frustration on Tuesday that the state Democratic party had bungled its moment in the national spotlight after the state Democratic party delayed releasing the results of the caucuses because of a technical glitch.
“They’re not complete, but results are in from a majority of precincts, and they show our campaign in first place,” said Pete Buttigieg, grinning widely as he addressed supporters in New Hampshire. “This is what we have been working more than a year to convince our fellow Americans: that a new and better vision can bring about a new and better day.
Pete Buttigieg, the previously little-known former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, held a narrow lead in the Iowa caucuses on Tuesday night, according to a partial release of a majority of the results by the state Democratic party a day after an embarrassing organizational breakdown that marred the biggest night of the election year so far.
With 71% of the precincts reporting from all of Iowa’s 99 counties, Buttigieg held 26.8% of the state’s delegate count, trailed closely by the Vermont senator Bernie Sanders with 25.2%, the Massachusetts senator Elizabeth Warren with 18.4% and the former vice-president Joe Biden falling well behind with 15.4%. Sanders, meanwhile, had so far earned the largest share of total votes cast.
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That’s it from me after a very anti-climatic night in Des Moines. The Democratic presidential candidates and the media circus accompanying them are leaving Iowa with no sense of who won the first voting state in the nominating contest.
Here’s where things stand:
One reporter described Iowa Democratic party chairman Troy Price’s voice on the press call as “deflated”, which is understandable considering the organization saw its worst nightmare unfold before its eyes tonight.
"Thank you and we will be in touch soon," Price said.
An understatement to say he sounded deflated. Since his election in 2017, it's been his sole mission to try to make a fairer, more transparent Iowa caucus that would also run seamlessly. Tonight was IDP's worst nightmare.
The Democratic presidential primary contest got off to a disastrous start on Monday after results from the highly anticipated Iowa Democratic caucuses were dramatically delayed due to “inconsistencies” in the reporting of the data.
The state’s Democratic party said it was performing “quality control” on the numbers “out of an abundance of caution” following reports of problems with a phone app used to relay vote tallies.
Hundreds of thousands of Iowans are barred from the Iowa caucus because of physical and legal barriers
As Democratic candidatesbegan a last minute blitz across Iowa on Friday evening, nearly a dozen men gathered in a cavernous YMCA meeting room in downtown Des Moines to have a conversation that felt a universe removed from the 2020 race.
They were part of one of the largest groups shut out of Monday’s caucus: people with felony convictions. Iowans are barred from voting for life once they commit a felony, and people can’t vote even if they committed a crime decades ago. The state’s policy, one of the strictest in the country, means more than 42,000 Iowans out of prison won’t have a say in choosing a presidential candidate. Almost 10% of the black voting age population can’t vote because of a felony conviction.
More than a dozen candidates are running to take on Donald Trump in the presidential election this year. But first they must win the Democratic nomination. Lauren Gambino explains the process
White House sends letter saying book cannot be published
Today is first of two days of question-and-answer sessions at trial
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The impeachment managers have repeatedly used their answers to make an argument for calling witnesses, specifically John Bolton.
We are 17 questions in, with the witness issue emerging frequently. Dems using some questions to argue that Bolton could answer outstanding issues. WH team saying that if Bolton were called, many other witnesses would be, too, and proceedings would drag on for months.
Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY): “The Senate in its history has had 15 different impeachment trials. In every single trial there were witnesses. Every single trial. Why should this president be treated differently...” https://t.co/up2CQNLRW8pic.twitter.com/8CoK6RvYZg
Democratic senators were visibly stunned when Alan Dershowitz made his argument that Trump was acting in the public interest by pushing for investigations of Democrats because the president considers his reelection to be in the public interest.
Dems' reaction to Dershowitz's case just now would've been great TV:
- When Dersh suggested reelection concerns fit in national interest, Bernie turned to Schatz, who mouthed either "WHA" or "WOW"
- Gillibrand and Merkley made frustrated hand motions
Six candidates to debate at Drake University in Des Moines
Sanders, Warren, Biden, Buttigieg, Klobuchar and Steyer feature
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Hours before the debate on Tuesday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced that the House would vote to send its impeachment charges against Donald Trump to the Senate the following day.
Even though six Democratic presidential candidates failed to meet the polling requirement for tonight’s debate, one candidate who did manage to cross that threshold will not be onstage tonight: Michael Bloomberg.
Biden is too gaffe-prone; Sanders and Warren are too far left; Buttigieg, too young. But which one is capable of beating Trump?
Democrats overwhelmingly agree that their top priority in 2020 is to remove Donald Trump from office. But which of the many Democrats running for president is best suited to the task remains a source of deep anxiety and division less than five weeks before the Iowa caucuses.
After more than a year of campaigning, the Democratic presidential primary enters the final sprint before voting begins on 3 February in Iowa in a familiar but fluid state: Joe Biden in the lead, trailed by Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren with Pete Buttigieg also showing signs of strength in the early states.
Exclusive: the Vermont senator speaks to the Guardian about his rivals’ support from billionaires, and his plan to beat Trump
Bernie Sanders on Friday doubled down on criticism of fellow Democratic presidential candidates Pete Buttigieg and Joe Biden over the support they’ve received from billionaire donors, arguing his 2020 rivals’ fundraising was “exactly the problem with American politics”.
Following Guardian queries, 2020 hopeful says Kavanaugh should never have been placed on supreme court
Pete Buttigieg’s 2020 campaign is returning thousands of dollars in donations from two top Washington lawyers who represented Brett Kavanaugh in his controversial confirmation hearing, saying it will not accept funds from people who helped secure the justice’s seat on the supreme court.
Buttigieg’s campaign received $7,200 from Alexandra Walsh – $3,150 of which had already been returned because it exceeded limits – and attended a fundraiser in July that was co-hosted by the Washington lawyer. Buttigieg also received $2,800 from Beth Wilkinson, Walsh’s law partner, who also represented Kavanaugh.
A surging Pete Buttigieg avoided major criticism while Tulsi Gabbard reinforced her outsider status in Atlanta debate
Some of the candidates used the explosive congressional testimony from the ambassador to the EU, Gordon Sondland, earlier in the day as a launchpad to renew calls for Donald Trump’s impeachment.
The 37-year-old mayor from Indiana has his vulnerabilities, but has become a contender for the presidency in just a few months
On a November evening a dozen years ago, Barack Obama – who at the time was the 46-year-old junior senator from Illinois – appeared at the annual fundraising dinner-rally of the Iowa Democratic party, at which all of the 2008 Democratic presidential contestants were given about 10 minutes to speak. Obama came in as underdog to the frontrunner, Hillary Clinton, but delivered such a barn-burning stemwinder of a speech that he left as the favorite. A little more than three months later, he won the Iowa caucuses – the first major contest on the US presidential campaign calendar – and the rest is history.
None of the Democratic presidential hopefuls who spoke at last week’s Iowa Democratic party Liberty and Justice Celebration pulled off an Obama-level breakout performance. But the one who came closest was Pete Buttigieg, the 37-year-old mayor of South Bend, Indiana. Buttigieg hewed closely to the Obama playbook in making a case for his candidacy, and his Iowa speech seems likely to boost him in the polls at just the moment when the other leading candidates are showing some worrisome weaknesses.