Democratic presidential primary debate (November 20, 2019)
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Date: November 3, 2020 |
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The Democratic Party held a presidential primary debate on November 20, 2019.[1] It was the fifth of 11 Democratic primary debates that took place during the 2020 presidential election.
Candidates had until November 13, 2019, to qualify by reaching a fundraising threshold of 165,000 unique contributors and one of two polling thresholds. For the full list of requirements, click here.
Ten candidates qualified for the debate:
This page provides an overview of the hosts, venue, moderators, qualifications, and participants.
HIGHLIGHTS
Debate overview
Video and transcript
By the numbers
Candidate highlights
This section includes highlights for each presidential candidate with a focus on policy. The following paraphrased statements were compiled from NBC News' debate transcript. A candidate's opponents are generally not mentioned in his or her summary unless there was a significant exchange between them.
- Joe Biden discussed electability, healthcare, impeachment, climate change, foreign policy, violence against women, and marijuana. Biden said the Democratic nominee needed to be able to defeat Donald Trump and get a Democratic majority in the Senate. He said he would not dictate who the Justice Department should prosecute. Biden said Medicare for All would not pass in the House of Representatives. He called for expanding the Affordable Care Act. Biden said he had the most foreign policy experience. He said he would build alliances, hold Saudi Arabia accountable, and put pressure on North Korea and China. He called climate change an existential threat to humanity. Biden said he would reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act and that men should be more involved in changing the culture of how women are treated. Biden said marijuana should be decriminalized. He was the third-most active participant in the debate, speaking for 12.8 minutes.
- Cory Booker discussed a wealth tax, housing, unifying the country, foreign policy, black voter outreach, and abortion. Booker said he supported raising the estate tax and taxing capital gains over a wealth tax. He said he would create more pathways to prosperity and entrepreneurship in inner-city and rural areas. Booker said the next president needed to unify and heal the country. On housing, Booker described his experience working on tenants’ issues, criticized gentrification, and discussed a tax credit for renters. Booker said that foreign policy should not be transactional but rather led by American values and human rights. Booker said black voters needed to be inspired to turn out. He said the war on drugs was a war on black and brown people and criticized Joe Biden’s marijuana stance. Booker said abortion restrictions in Georgia were the result of voter suppression. Booker was the fifth-most active participant in the debate, speaking for 11.5 minutes.
- Pete Buttigieg discussed impeachment, unity, political experience, healthcare, farming subsidies, black voters, and voting rights. Buttigieg said the impeachment process should be beyond politics. He said he was focused on unifying the country after the Trump presidency. Buttigieg discussed Medicare for All Who Want It. He said requiring people to use a public option would be divisive. Buttigieg criticized small refinery waivers and consolidation in farming. He said he would address the trade war so farm subsidies were not needed. Buttigieg said military spending needed to be reprioritized to reflect modern threats like artificial intelligence. Buttigieg said he cared about addressing racial inequality because of his faith and his experience seeing his own rights threatened. He defended his political experience and national security policy when Tulsi Gabbard questioned his judgment. Buttigieg was the second-most active participant in the debate, speaking for 12.9 minutes.
- Tulsi Gabbard discussed regime change, climate change, racial injustice, and political experience. Gabbard said the Democratic Party was being influenced by the military-industrial complex and corporate interests. She called for an end to what she described as the Bush-Clinton-Trump foreign policy of regime change wars. To address climate change, Gabbard said she would end subsidies to the fossil fuel industry and transition to a green renewable energy economy. Gabbard called for institutional change to address racial inequality, including overhauling the criminal justice system and ending the war on drugs. She also discussed voting rights and election security, calling for mandated paper ballots. Gabbard said Buttigieg lacked national security experience and contrasted his political record to her own. She also defended herself against criticism from Kamala Harris, saying she put people over party interests. Gabbard was the eighth-most active participant in the debate, speaking for 9.2 minutes.
- Kamala Harris discussed impeachment, the Obama coalition, paid family leave, foreign policy, and black voter outreach. Harris said Donald Trump was engaged in a criminal enterprise and that justice for all was on the ballot. Harris questioned Tulsi Gabbard for criticizing the Democratic Party. Harris said the Democratic nominee needed to be able to rebuild the Obama coalition of voters. She said she supported six months of paid family leave to reflect the reality of women’s lives, including childcare, eldercare, and pay inequity. Harris called Trump the greatest national security threat and criticized his foreign policy on climate change, Iran, and the Koreas. Harris said black voters, particularly black women, were being taken for granted. She said black maternal mortality rates, gun violence, and pay inequity needed to be addressed. Harris was the sixth-most active participant in the debate, speaking for 11.5 minutes.
- Amy Klobuchar discussed impeachment, double standards for women, fiscal responsibility, foreign policy, abortion, and voting rights. Klobuchar said she believed Donald Trump engaged in impeachable conduct but her role in the process was to act as a potential juror reviewing each charge. Klobuchar said women were held to a higher standard than men in politics. She said that experience mattered and she had passed over 100 bills and won red and purple congressional districts. Klobuchar said she specified how she would pay for her proposals and that politicians should be fiscally responsible and honest. She criticized free college tuition for all and Medicare for All. On foreign policy, Klobuchar said the United States needed to restart negotiations with Russia about nuclear weapons. On abortion, she said Roe v. Wade needed to be codified into law. Klobuchar was the seventh-most active participant in the debate, speaking for 11 minutes.
- Bernie Sanders discussed impeachment, Medicare for All, climate change, foreign policy, Saudi Arabia, abortion, and voting issues. Sanders said Donald Trump had violated the law but that Democrats needed to also focus on healthcare, climate change, and homelessness. He said the attorney general should decide if Trump should be criminally prosecuted. Sanders said in his first week in office he would introduce Medicare for All. Sanders called climate change a national emergency and said the fossil fuel industry was probably criminally liable. Sanders discussed his opposition to the Iraq War and the Gulf War. He said he wanted to bring troops in Afghanistan back home. He also said the U.S. needed to reconsider its alliances and called Saudia Arabia a dictatorship. Sanders said everyone over 18 should have the right to vote. Sanders was the fourth-most active participant in the debate, speaking for 11.8 minutes.
- Tom Steyer discussed coalitions against corporate power, structural reform, sustainable housing, climate change, and voter turnout. Steyer called for term limits and direct democracy. He said the grassroots organization he built, NextGen America, conducted the largest youth voter mobilization effort in U.S. history in 2018. Steyer said inequality begins with housing. He said more housing units needed to be built in a sustainable way and that he would direct federal dollars to make rent affordable for working people. Steyer called climate change his number-one priority. He said he would declare a state of emergency on his first day as president and frame his policy through environmental justice. Steyer was the ninth-most active participant in the debate, speaking for 8.4 minutes.
- Elizabeth Warren discussed impeachment, wealth taxes, Medicare for All, housing, military service, border policy, and abortion. Warren said no one is above the law and condemned corruption in Washington. She said she would not give ambassadorships to large donors. She discussed her wealth tax, saying it wasn’t about punishment but rather acknowledging that wealth is created in this country using tax-supported resources. Warren discussed how her Medicare for All proposal would be implemented over three years. Warren proposed building 3.2 million new housing units and said student loan debt forgiveness could help close the racial wealth gap. She said more Americans should serve in the military and called for other forms of shared service. She also discussed a values-driven border policy and said abortion rights were human rights. Warren was the most active participant in the debate, speaking for 13.5 minutes.
- Andrew Yang discussed national security, the financial burden of childcare, coalition building, data regulation, domestic terrorism, and economic opportunity for the next generation. As commander-in-chief, Yang said he would focus on five threats of tomorrow: climate change, artificial intelligence, loose nuclear material, military drones, and non-state actors. On domestic issues, Yang said passing paid family leave would be one of his first priorities. He also discussed how universal basic income could provide for childcare. On foreign policy, Yang said he would recommit to international partnerships and coalition-building to counter Russia and China. He also called for establishing a new world data organization. During the debate, Yang defended Steyer from attacks on his wealth, saying Steyer was using his money to fight climate change. Yang also said white supremacist violence was domestic terrorism. Yang was the least active participant in the debate, speaking for 6.8 minutes.
Qualifications
On September 23, 2019, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) released the criteria for qualifying for the debate via polling and fundraising.[2]
Polling criteria
A candidate had two ways to meet the polling threshold to qualify for the November debate:
- Four Poll Threshold: Receive 3 percent support or more in at least four national or early state polls—Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and/or Nevada. The four polls must be sponsored by different poll sponsors or in different geographical areas if sponsored by the same poll sponsor.
- Early State Poll Threshold: Receive 5 percent support or more in at least two single state polls in Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and/or Nevada. The two polls may be from the same geographical area and poll sponsor.
Eligible polls must have been sponsored by one of the following poll sponsors:
- Associated Press
- ABC News/Washington Post
- CBS News/YouGov
- CNN
- Des Moines Register
- Fox News
- Monmouth University
- National Public Radio
- NBC News/Wall Street Journal
- NBC News/Marist
- New York Times
- Quinnipiac University
- University of New Hampshire
- USA Today/Suffolk University
- Winthrop University
Eligible polls must also have met the following requirements:
- Each poll must be publicly released between September 13, 2019, and seven days before the November debate.
- Each poll’s candidate support question must have been conducted by reading or presenting a list of Democratic presidential primary candidates to respondents. Poll questions using an open-ended or un-aided question to gauge presidential primary support will not count.
- Each polling result must be the top-line number listed in the original public release from the poll sponsor, whether or not it is a rounded or weighted number.[2]
Grassroots fundraising
Candidates must also have provided verifiable evidence that they reached the following fundraising thresholds:
- Donations from at least 165,000 unique donors; and
- A minimum of 600 unique donors per state in at least 20 states.[2]
Who qualified?
The following chart shows which Democratic presidential candidates qualified for the debate and how far each candidate was from crossing the polling and donor thresholds.
Democratic presidential primary debates, 2019-2020
- See also: Democratic presidential nomination, 2020
The following table provides an overview of the date, location, host, and number of participants in each scheduled 2020 Democratic presidential primary debate.
Democratic presidential debate participation, 2019-2020
History of televised presidential debates
Although the 1960 general election debate between John F. Kennedy (D) and Richard Nixon (R) is frequently cited as the first televised presidential debate, two came before it.
The first televised presidential debate took place on May 21, 1956, when an ABC affiliate in Miami broadcast a Democratic primary debate between Adlai Stevenson and Estes Kefauver.[3] In the general election that year, Stevenson and incumbent President Dwight Eisenhower (R) used surrogates in a televised debate on November 4, 1956. They were represented by former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt (D) and Sen. Margaret Chase Smith (R), respectively.[4]
The Kennedy-Nixon debates that took place four years later showed the importance of television as a visual medium, "Nixon, pale and underweight from a recent hospitalization, appeared sickly and sweaty, while Kennedy appeared calm and confident. As the story goes, those who listened to the debate on the radio thought Nixon had won. But those listeners were in the minority. ... Those that watched the debate on TV thought Kennedy was the clear winner. Many say Kennedy won the election that night," TIME reported on the 50th anniversary of the event.[5]
While a handful of presidential primary debates were held between 1964 and 1972, the televised presidential debate did not become a staple of American politics until 1976.[6]
Übersicht
The following chart shows the number of presidential and vice presidential debates that took place in each election cycle between 1960 and 2024.
List of presidential debates, 1960-2024
The following table shows the date, location, and moderators for each presidential debate between 1960 and 2024.[7]
| Presidential debates, 1960-2024 | ||
|---|---|---|
| Date | Standort | Moderator |
| September 26, 1960 | Chicago, IL | Howard K. Smith, CBS News |
| October 7, 1960 | Washington, D.C. | Frank McGee, NBC |
| October 13, 1960 | Los Angeles, CA / New York, NY | Bill Shadel, ABC |
| October 21, 1960 | New York, NY | Quincy Howe, ABC News |
| September 23, 1976 | Philadelphia, PA | Edwin Newman, NBC News |
| October 6, 1976 | San Francisco, CA | Pauline Frederick, NPR |
| October 22, 1976 | Williamsburg, VA | Barbara Walters, ABC News |
| September 21, 1980 | Baltimore, MD | Bill Moyers, PBS |
| October 28, 1980 | Cleveland, OH | Howard K. Smith, ABC News |
| October 7, 1984 | Louisville, KY | Barbara Walters, ABC News |
| October 21, 1984 | Kansas City, MO | Edwin Newman, formerly NBC News |
| September 25, 1988 | Winson-Salem, N.C. | Jim Lehrer, PBS |
| October 13, 1988 | Los Angeles, CA | Bernard Shaw, CNN |
| October 11, 1992 | St. Louis, MO | Jim Lehrer, PBS |
| October 15, 1992 | Richmond, VA | Carole Simpson, ABC |
| October 19, 1992 | East Lansing, MI | Jim Lehrer, PBS |
| October 6, 1996 | Hartford, CT | Jim Lehrer, PBS |
| October 16, 1996 | San Diego, CA | Jim Lehrer, PBS |
| October 3, 2000 | Boston, MA | Jim Lehrer, PBS |
| October 11, 2000 | Winson-Salem, N.C. | Jim Lehrer, PBS |
| October 17, 2000 | St. Louis, MO | Jim Lehrer, PBS |
| September 30, 2004 | Coral Gables, FL | Jim Lehrer, PBS |
| October 8, 2004 | St. Louis, MO | Charles Gibson, ABC |
| October 13, 2004 | Tempe, AZ | Bob Schieffer, CBS |
| September 26, 2008 | Oxford, MS | Jim Lehrer, PBS |
| October 7, 2008 | Nashville, TN | Tom Brokaw, NBC |
| October 15, 2008 | Hempstead, NY | Bob Schieffer, CBS |
| October 3, 2012 | Denver, CO | Jim Lehrer, PBS |
| October 16, 2012 | Hempstead, NY | Candy Crowley, CNN |
| October 22, 2012 | Boca Raton, FL | Bob Schieffer, CBS |
| September 26, 2016 | Hempstead, NY | Lester Holt, NBC |
| October 9, 2016 | St. Louis, MO | Martha Raddatz, ABC Anderson Cooper, CNN |
| October 19, 2016 | Las Vegas, NV | Chris Wallace, FOX |
| September 29, 2020 | Cleveland, OH | Chris Wallace, FOX |
| October 22, 2020 | Nashville, TN | Kristen Welker, NBC |
| June 27, 2024 | Atlanta, GA | Dana Bash and Jake Tapper, CNN |
| September 10, 2024 | Philadelphia, PA | David Muir and Linsey Davis, ABC |
See also
- Presidential candidates, 2020
- Democratic presidential nomination, 2020
- Republican presidential nomination, 2020
- Presidential debates (2015-2016)
Footnotes
- ↑ Democrats.org, "DNC Announces Details For Fifth Democratic Presidential Primary Debate," October 8, 2019
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Democratic National Committee, "DNC Announces Qualification Criteria For Fifth Presidential Primary Debate," September 23, 2019
- ↑ Illinois Channel, "From 1956, the First Televised Presidential Debate," June 15, 2016
- ↑ United States Senate, "The First Televised Presidential Debate," accessed June 12, 2019
- ↑ TIME, "How the Nixon-Kennedy Debate Changed the World," September 23, 2010
- ↑ Center for Politics, "Eight Decades of Debate," July 30, 2015
- ↑ Commission on Presidential Debates, "Debate History," accessed September 28, 2020
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