In last month’s first Democratic presidential debate, Sen. Kamala Harris used an unexpected broadside against frontrunner Joe Biden to seize the spotlight among the crowded field and reinvigorate her campaign.
The former vice president has warned that Harris won’t get the same opportunity to catch him off guard in a highly anticipated rematch during Wednesday’s second Democratic debate.
Biden has suggested he’ll be more ready to defend his record and counterpunch as the two go toe-to-toe again in the center of the stage. Meanwhile, Harris and Biden could face attacks on their own records from the eight other candidates lined up on stage, all jostling for attention during one of their last chances for a breakout moment.
Here’s a few of the biggest trends to watch:
Biden was clearly unprepared when Harris challenged him last month over his decades-old opposition to busing in public schools. Allies have since said that the attack — and especially Harris’ cutting preamble that “I do not believe you are a racist” — hit a nerve for Biden, whose son Beau was a friend and close political ally of Harris.
“I’m not going to be as polite this time,” Biden told supporters at a Detroit fundraiser last week. “If they want to argue about the past, I can do that,” he added, describing Harris’ past as “not so good.” Harris, meanwhile, responded that “I was raised to be polite.”
Expect the moderators to pit the two candidates against each other, re-litigating the earlier spar and prompting the two to clash over criminal justice issues. Biden could take aim at Harris’ record as prosecutor in San Francisco, while Harris could expand more on Biden’s history in the Senate.
Unlike last time, Harris won’t be the only major candidate taking on Biden directly. Standing to the other side of the former vice president Wednesday night will be New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, who’s also excoriated the frontrunner over his record supporting tough-on-crime bills and his comments about working with senators who supported segregation. Booker appeared during the first night of the two-stage debate last month, so he’ll be making up for lost time.
Biden’s campaign is ready, with a spokeswoman releasing a statement this week bashing Booker over his leadership of the Newark, N.J. police department while he was mayor.
New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, meanwhile, has telegraphed a new line of attack on Biden over his past opposition to expanding the child tax credit, saying that some unnamed candidates in the race “do not believe necessarily that it’s a good idea that women work outside the home.”
Landing a compelling attack on Biden could give either of the Northeast senators a boost in their campaigns, which have struggled to gain traction despite early promise.
For months, Harris has struggled to articulate a clear position on health care, voicing support for Medicare-for-All but waffling on the details. This week, she released her own plan, suggesting a 10-year transition period to a system under which Americans would have the choice about buying into Medicare and private insurance companies would still be allowed to sell plans that fit Medicare’s requirements.
It’s a change from the proposal championed by Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, which would all but erase private companies from the health insurance industry. Harris also claims she could fund the system without new taxes on the middle class, unlike Sanders and Warren’s proposal.
While Harris’ plan received positive reviews from health policy experts, she immediately faced criticism from rivals on the left and the right. Sanders’ team blasted it as a sell-out for insurance firms. “Call it anything you want, but you can’t call this plan Medicare-for-All,” campaign manager Faiz Shakir declared in a statement. Biden’s campaign, meanwhile, tarred her plan a “have-it-every-which-way approach” that represents “a refusal to be straight with the American middle class.”
Biden could bring up that line on Wednesday, and while Sanders won’t be on the same stage, some of the other long-shot liberal candidates, such as Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard or New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, could reprise similar attacks. Gabbard in particular has trained her fire on Harris in recent weeks, saying she’s unqualified and “lacks the temperament” to be commander-in-chief.
One presidential contender who won’t be on the stage Tuesday or Wednesday night is San Francisco billionaire Tom Steyer, who jumped in the race earlier this month. But early state voters will still get to hear directly from Steyer: his campaign has bought ad time in Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina both Tuesday and Wednesday nights.
Steyer’s spot features the candidate blasting Trump as “a fraud and a failure,” and contrasting his business history with Steyer’s record building his hedge fund. Meanwhile, Steyer’s pro-impeachment group Need to Impeach will also air a separate ad cutting footage from former special counsel Robert Mueller’s congressional testimony last week.
The ad buy is the latest sign of Steyer muscling into contention thanks to his massive fortune. He’s pledged to invest $100 million into the race, and the spending has already started to pay off, with several early state polls putting him as high as 4 percent — above many candidates who’ve been in the race for far longer.
