8:07 p.m.: The first question went to Biden, who was asked what he’d do to persuade the roughly half of Americans who don’t think President Trump should have been impeached.
“We need to restore the integrity of the presidency,” Biden said, adding it’s his job to make sure Mr. Trump isn’t in office another four years.
Sanders, given the same question, claimed Mr. Trump has sold out the working people of this country, and has lied “thousands” of times since taking office.
“We have a president who is a pathological liar, we have a president who is running the most corrupt administration in the history of this country,” Sanders said.
Warren accused the president of normalizing corruption, even after he promised to “drain the swamp.”
“From tax breaks to ambassadorships, we have to prosecute the case against him and that means” the country needs a candidate who can draw the sharpest distinction, Warren said.
“That’s why I’m in this race,” she added.
Klobuchar said what the president did in attempting to get a foreign nation to intervene in the U.S. election is exactly why the founders created the tool of impeachment.
“This is a global ‘Watergate,'” Klobuchar said.
Klobuchar called for the president’s top aides, like acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, to testify.
“If President Trump thinks that he should not be impeached, he should be not scared to put forward his own witnesses,” Klobuchar said.
Buttigieg said that no matter what happens in any Senate trial, Americans have the chance to vote in 2020.
“We cannot give into that sense of helplessness, because that’s what they want,” Buttigieg said.
Yang said American leaders aren’t focusing on the problems that led to Mr. Trump’s election, largely blaming the media for getting the country to this point.
“We have to stop being obsessed with impeachment … and start actually digging in and solving the problems that got Donald Trump elected in the first place,” Yang said.
