Democratic presidential candidates in the United States started the third round of their televised debates during the night of Friday: a total of ten candidates had qualified for the event in Houston, Texas. Prerequisite for this were certain minimum values in surveys and donations. The following Democrats made it into the round: Amy Klobuchar, Cory Booker, Pete Buttigieg, Bernie Sanders, Joe Biden, Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris, Andrew Yang, Beto O'Rourke and Julián Castro.
This was the first debate in this pre-election campaign, in which the three candidates who are currently in the lead in the polls, were meeting. These are former US Vice President Biden and Senators Warren and Sanders.
David J. Phillip / AP
Sanders, Biden and Warren in Texas
All ten politicians on the stage had one thing in common: they criticized Donald Trump. The US president has "obviously no strategy" in his trade dispute with China, said Pete Buttigieg, for example. Bernie Sanders said that the US president has no idea. "Trump thinks trade policy is a tweet at 3 in the morning." Amy Klobuchar accused Trump of treating farmers and workers "like poker chips in one of his bankrupt casinos".
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Photo gallery: The candidates of the third TV debate - who they are and what they wantSeveral of the candidates attacked Trump for his asylum policy. For example, Warren accused him of creating a crisis in the hope of profiting politically. Big applause was given to Beto O'Rourke when he announced his commitment to much sharper gun laws. Bullets of semi-automatic weapons are designed to "shred everything in your body." If a weapon is meant to kill people on a battlefield ... "then we'll surely take their AR-15s and their AK-47s and we will not allow them to be used against an American compatriot."
In passionate answer on gun violence, Beto O'Rourke says, "We're not going to. Hell-yes, we're going to take your AR-15, your AK-47 https://t.co/bymIJ9m9TG #DemDebate pic.twitter.com/omGRg66sqj
- ABC News Politics (@ABCPolitics) September 13, 2019Kamala Harris came up with the latest attack in El Paso. Of course, Trump did not pull the trigger, "but he definitely tweeted the ammunition".
The television sessions offer Democrats the opportunity to present themselves to a national audience. The first two debates in Miami and Detroit each had 20 Democrats, spread over two evenings. For the third round were now higher hurdles for participation - so this time only ten Democrats were there.