The press unanimously agrees that the biggest moment from Tuesday’s Democratic presidential debate was when Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., rescued Hillary Clinton from uncomfortable questions involving her State Department emails.
“It was perhaps Sanders’s best [moment],” the New York Times’ Frank Bruni wrote.
In response to being asked by CNN’s Anderson Cooper to weigh in on Clinton’s ongoing scandal, Sanders said that no one is interested in hearing about her “damn emails.”
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The room went wild.
CNN said, “The biggest applause line of the night went to Sanders.” The Los Angeles Times claimed that the highlight of the evening “was definitely when Bernie Sanders weighed in on Hillary Rodham Clinton’s ongoing email saga.”
“Bernie Sanders delivered the line of the night,” the New York Daily News added, citing data gathered from social media.
And it appears that the press’ analysis is correct.
Along with generating seemingly endless newsroom chatter, Sanders’ response also became the most-talked about moment of the evening on social media.
“The hashtag #DamnEmails began trending on Facebook and soon became the top social moment of the night, according to the company. It was also the most retweeted Tweet of any presidential candidate during the debate, according to Twitter,” Wired reported.
It all started with Cooper asking Clinton about her use of a private, unauthorized email server when she worked at the State Department.
“You dismissed it; you joked about it; you called it a mistake. What does that say about your ability to handle far more challenging crises as president?” he asked.
“Well, I’ve taken responsibility for it. I did say it was a mistake. What I did was allowed by the State Department, but it wasn’t the best choice,” Clinton responded, adding later that the entire investigation is nothing more than a GOP-led political witch hunt.
The matter is serious enough that the Federal Bureau of Investigation has launched a criminal probe into whether Clinton and her team sent or received highly sensitive and classified state secrets over an unsecured server.
Cooper turned to Sanders and asked the senator to respond to the issue.
“Let me say — let me say something that may not be great politics,” Sanders said. “But I think the secretary is right, and that is that the American people are sick and tired of hearing about your damn emails.”
As the room erupted in loud cheers and applause, a laughing, smiling Clinton nodded, “Me, too. Me, too.”
Sanders continued, adding, “You know? The middle class, Anderson, and let me say something about the media, as well. I go around the country, talk to a whole lot of people. Middle class in this country is collapsing.”
“We have 27 million people living in poverty. We have massive wealth and income inequality. Our trade policies have cost us millions of decent jobs,” he said. “Enough of the emails. Let’s talk about the real issues facing America.”
The two candidates then turned to each other, grinning broadly, and shook hands.
“[T]he moment that got perhaps the most attention of the evening was prompted by an opinion [Clinton and Sanders] share,” Variety reported. “The moment drew the largest applause and cheers from the crowd of Democrats — presumably dominated by Clinton and Sanders supporters — in a debate that was heavily focused on policy versus personality.”
