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Milwaukee • Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders battled for the crucial backing of black and Hispanic voters in Thursday night's Democratic debate and clashed heatedly over their support for Barack Obama as the presidential race shifted toward states with more minority voters.
Clinton, who has cast herself as the rightful heir to Obama's legacy, accused Sanders of diminishing the president's record and short-changing his leadership.
"The kind of criticism I hear from Senator Sanders, I expect from Republicans. I do not expect it from someone seeking the Democratic nomination," Clinton said in a sharp exchange at the close of the two-hour debate in Milwaukee. Her biting comments followed an interview in which Sanders suggested Obama hadn't succeeded in closing the gap between Congress and the American people — something Obama himself has acknowledged.
Sanders responded sharply: "Madam Secretary, that is a low blow." And he noted that Clinton was the only one on the stage who ran against Obama in the 2008 presidential race.
After splitting this year's first two states with Sanders, Clinton also renewed her assertion that her unexpectedly strong rival was energizing voters with promises "that cannot be kept."
Seeking to boost his own support with minorities, Sanders peppered his typically economic-focused rhetoric with calls to reform a "broken criminal justice system."
"At the end of my first term, we will not have more people in jail than any other country," he said.
In one of many moments of agreement between the candidates, Clinton concurred on a need to address a criminal justice system that incarcerates a disproportionate number of minorities. But she cast her proposals for fighting racial inequality as broader than his.
"We're going to emphasize education, jobs and housing," said Clinton.