Socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton bickered over exactly how high to raise the federal minimum wage during Thursday night’s Democratic presidential debate in New York.
In response to a question from CNN’s Wolf Blitzer about how to “bring back” jobs from overseas, Sanders expressed his desire to mandate a minimum wage increase and picked a fight with Clinton.
“For a start we’re going to raise the minimum wage to 15-bucks-an-hour,” Sanders said. “And number two, while it is true we may end up paying a few cents more for a hamburger in McDonald’s, at the end of the day, what this economy desperately needs is to rebuild our manufacturing sector with good paying jobs.”
Sanders closed his answer with a parting shot at Clinton, noting that she voted for trade agreements that he said cost American workers their jobs. Clinton responded with a dismissive laugh and talked about her “comprehensive” jobs plan.
“I think you’ve got to go at this with a sense of how to accomplish the goal we are setting,” she said. “More good jobs with rising incomes for people everywhere from inner-cities to rural areas to every distressed community in America and that’s exactly what my plan would bring about. I think we have a pretty good record if we look at what happened in the 1990s, we got 23 million new jobs and incomes went up for everybody let’s do that again in America.”
When pressed by Blitzer on whether she would sign a $15-an-hour federal minimum wage bill passed by a Democratic congress, Clinton answered, “of course.” Clinton cited her support of and endorsements from ‘Fight for $15’ activists.
Sanders said he thought a lot of people would be “surprised” to hear what Clinton said, which prompted a shouting match. Blitzer urged the two to calm down and said, “If you’re both screaming at each other, the viewers won’t be able to hear either of you so please don’t talk over each other.”
Sanders then claimed that he supported a $15 minimum wage, while Clinton had merely pushed for $12. Clinton responded by noting that she supported mandating a minimum wage of $12, while urging states to “go as quickly as possible to get to 15.”
“I want to get something done, and I think setting the goal to 12 is the way to go, encouraging others to get to 15, but of course if we have a Democratic congress, we will go to 15,” Clinton said.
“Well I think the secretary has confused a lot of people,” Sanders responded. “I don’t know how you’re there for the fight for 15, when you say you want a 12-dollar-an-hour national minimum wage.”
Clinton and Sanders largely avoided shouting matches in previous debates, but the rigors of the campaign season appeared to make their tempers flare at a moment’s notice on Thursday in Brooklyn.
