White House hopeful, Hillary Clinton and her fellow democrat, Bernie Sanders, have locked horns over who will better defend the policies of incumbent President, Barack Obama.
In their first debate since the New Hampshire Primary, Mrs Clinton sought to cast herself as the protector of Barack Obama’s legacy, sharply attacking Mr Sanders for criticising the President.
Meanwhile, Mr Sanders took pains to tailor his message of economic fairness to address disparities in black communities.
Immigration reform was also a major topic of discussion. Both candidates supported creating a path to citizenship for the nearly 11 million undocumented immigrants in the US and they decried a recent uptick in deportations by the Obama administration.
Criticising the anti-immigrant positions of Republican front-runner Donald Trump, Mr Sanders said immigrants should not be scapegoats for economic uncertainty.
“We have got to stand up to the Trumps of the world, who are trying to divide us,” Mr Sanders said.
The CNN reports that Clinton accused Sanders of calling Obama “weak” and a “disappointment” in the past and she warned that “the kind of criticism that we heard from Senator Sanders about our President, I expect from Republicans. I do not expect (it) from someone running for the Democratic nomination to succeed President Obama.” Sanders was furious: “Madam Secretary, that is a low blow”.
He insisted that Obama was his friend, but that did not mean that a senator had to agree with the President on everything.
“One of us ran against President Obama,” Sanders said, responding to Clinton’s 2008 showdown against the then-Illinois Senator. “I was not that candidate.”
Nevada and South Carolina, States with large minority populations would vote next.
