Author: Charlie Spiering

Former Vice President Joe Biden was interrupted by protesters on Thursday night during the Democrat debate on ABC News.
After ABC News debate moderator George Stephanopoulos asked each of the candidates to talk about their greatest professional setback and what they did to overcome it, Joe Biden began speaking but was immediately interrupted by protesters shouting and chanting.

Biden bowed his head and fell silent as Bernie Sanders gestured at the former vice president, urging him to keep speaking. Cory Booker took a drink of water, and Kamala Harris turned to Andrew Yang with a questioning look and asked, “What are they saying?” Beto O’Rourke turned and coughed behind him.
It was unclear what the protesters were protesting, but some on Twitter said they were DACA recipients.
“We are DACA recipients and our lives are at risk. Please save us,” they shouted, according to one person on Twitter.

Just to let everyone at home know the protests at the #DemDebate were DACA protesters reminding the candidates that they won’t be silenced
— Laura Gorsky (@lauragorsky) September 13, 2019

Some in the audience booed the protesters as they were escorted out of the debate and continued to shout.
The debate moderators apologized and promised to reset the clock for Biden’s response.

Mayor Pete Buttigieg criticized President Donald Trump’s use of tariffs in his trade fight with China, but he admitted he would also use tariffs as leverage to negotiate a deal.
Pete Buttigieg was asked on Thursday night by ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos if he would repeal Trump’s tariffs.

“I would have a strategy that would include them as leverage, he conceded, but added, “It’s not about the tariffs.”
Buttigieg criticized Trump’s use of tariffs, asserting that there was “a lack of a bigger strategy” in his ongoing fight with China.
He recalled when Trump mockingly said he would like to see a man like Buttigieg make a deal with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
“I’d like to see him make a deal with Xi Jinping,” Buttigieg quipped. “Wasn’t that supposed to happen in April?”
Buttigieg also criticized Trump for failing to lead the world on issues like climate change.
“The world needs America, but it just can’t be any America,” he said.

President Donald Trump gave a speech of his own concurrent with the Democrat debate on Thursday night, setting a sharp contrast with his potential 2020 presidential opponents.
The president traveled to Baltimore to speak at a dinner following a House Republican retreat, taking the stage at about 8:00 p.m. Eastern, just when the ABC News debate started.

He spoke for more than an hour.
Trump recalled speaking at a recent fundraiser, where he began by telling donors about what the country was facing from Democrat candidates for president.
“Whether you like me or not, it makes no difference because our country will go to hell if any of these people get in,” he said.
Trump said Republicans needed four more years in power in Washington to prevent Democrats from destroying the renewed American economy.
“We can’t let that happen. You won’t have energy. You won’t have business. You won’t have jobs. You won’t have income. It will be a disaster,” he said. “So you have to fight like hell.”
Trump said Republicans have to remember their duty to fight for the citizens of the United States first, over the rest of the world.
“We are fighting to protect their jobs, defend their families, and to ensure their children can live the American dream,” he said. “The Republican Party is actually loved in this country.”
The speech was a miniature version of a Trump rally, with plenty of jokes about his potential rivals, but he also urged his Republican colleagues to unity.
“If we stay bold in our actions and forever loyal to the citizens we serve, if we stay true to our mission, and we have to, and we have to stick together, like they do, they got nothing else on us,” Trump said.
Trump referred to historically low unemployment rates and poverty rates for African American and Hispanics.
How do you lose this debate? How do you lose the debate?” he asked as Republicans applauded. “That’s a tough one to beat.”

Former congressman Beto O’Rourke and Mayor Pete Buttigieg spoke about immigration and racism in Spanish during the ABC Debate on Thursday.
Both candidates deployed their Spanish skills in response to questions from ABC News debate moderator Jorge Ramos.

Ramos asked Buttigieg if he believed that Trump supporters were “racist” by supporting the president’s agenda.
“Anyone who supports this is supporting racism,” Buttigieg responded, repeating the same slogan in Spanish translated as, “This is racism and it’s simple.”
Later, Ramos asked Beto O’Rourke a question about visa overstays.
O’Rourke replied by proposing that the United States fully harmonize visa overstays into the entry-exit systems with Mexico and Canada.
He then launched into speech in Spanish, translated to “We know that if we need to secure our cities and our country, we have to treat people with dignity.”
Julian Castro spoke Spanish as he introduced himself at the beginning of the debate.
Ramos also spoke in Spanish as the debate began, reminding Spanish speakers in America that “this is our country too.”
“This debate is taking place at very difficult moment for Latinos in Texas and all over the country. That’s why it’s important they know that we know that this is also our country,” Ramos said.

President Donald Trump addressed House Republicans at a dinner on Thursday evening, reminding them of the upcoming 2020 political fight.
Trump said Republicans are not only fighting Democrats, but also the media, referring to the media’s heightened opposition to Republicans.

“It’s the Democrats, and it’s the media; we’re fighting two battles,” Trump said. “It’s as if they’re one because they are one. They’re working together. They’re colluding, and they’re obstructing.”
Trump’s line about “obstructing” drew laughter from House Republicans at the dinner, who spent most of 2017 fighting off the Democrat and media attempts to smear Trump with the Mueller investigation.
But the president joked that the media were probably more focused on his speech that night than they were on the Democrat debates, which was taking place at the same time.
“They should be watching the debate, but they’re probably watching us,” he said.
“With the grim specter of socialism descending on the Democrat party, it’s up to all of us to ensure the survival of American liberty. We have a very big task.”
Trump said Republicans should allow Democrats to run wild during the primary with all of their radical positions.
“Let ’em go,” he said. “Don’t criticize them too much.”
He said he probably attacked Sen. Elizabeth Warren too early with the “Pocahontas” hit for her false claim of heritage.
“I thought she was gone, but she emerged straight from the ashes. … She could even beat sleepy Joe,” he said, referring to former Vice President Joe Biden.

President Donald Trump said Thursday that he and first lady Melania Trump advised their teenage son Barron not to vape.
“We haven’t told him anything except ‘Don’t vape,’ Trump said. “Don’t vape, we don’t like vaping, I don’t like it.”

Barron Trump is 13-years-old.
The president commented to reporters as he left the White House to address a House Republican retreat in Baltimore.
On Wednesday, Trump and the first lady announced the administration’s plan to ban all non-tobacco flavored e-cigarettes to help prevent teen vaping.
The president criticized vaping “especially vaping as it pertains to innocent children” during an Oval Office meeting with Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar.
“They’re coming home and they’re saying, ‘Mom, I want to vape,’” he said about teenagers. “And the parents don’t know too much about it.”
Trump said the administration would remove certain flavors of vaping e-cigarettes to make them less attractive to children.
“It’s, again, very new and potentially very bad,” he said. “People think it’s an easy solution to cigarettes, but it’s turned out that it has its own difficulties.”
Trump said that the first lady, who was present in the meeting, was involved with the issue.
“I mean, she’s got a son — together — that is a beautiful young man, and she feels very, very strongly about it,” he said. “She’s seen it. We’re both reading it. A lot of people are reading it. But people are dying with vaping.”
Trump, who does not drink or smoke, raised all of his children with similar advice.
“When my children were growing up, even when they didn’t know what drinking was, I’d say ‘no alcohol, no cigarettes, no drugs,’” Trump recalled during a CNN town hall during the 2016 campaign.