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Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Ind., was repeatedly pushed onto the defensive in the sixth Democratic presidential debate on Thursday night, as several of his rivals challenged his political ascent by bluntly questioning his fund-raising practices and credentials for the presidency in a contentious and deeply substantive forum. Mr. Buttigieg has risen rapidly in the polls in Iowa and New Hampshire in recent months, after his persistent attacks on Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and her support for single-payer health care. (Glueck and Burns, 12/19)

A pointed and personal clash over the corrupting influence of wealthy campaign donors dominated the Democratic presidential debate Thursday, as Sen. Elizabeth Warren and South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg tangled over each other's ability to govern with integrity. The confrontation, which ignited after weeks of simmering disagreements between the two, provided the biggest fireworks in a night filled with elevated voices, waving arms and some of the most aggressive exchanges of any of the debates this year. (Viser, Scherer and Wang, 12/20)

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and former Vice President Joe Biden sparred over the Vermont senator’s signature "Medicare for All" proposal on Thursday night, highlighting a major rift in the presidential race. “I don’t think it is realistic,” Biden said of Sanders’s Medicare for All proposal during the Democratic debate. He pointed to its roughly $30 trillion cost over 10 years, also saying others have said it is closer to $20 trillion, a jab at Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), who also backs the idea, but with a somewhat lower price tag.  (Sullivan, 12/19)

“Put your hand down for a second,” Biden teased Sanders, as the Vermont senator waved to the moderators to get a chance to respond. “Joe’s plan” would “maintain the status quo,” Sanders said, rattling off details about how much American workers currently pay for private health insurance. “I’m going to interrupt now,” Biden replied. “It’s going to cost $30 trillion over 10 years.” He called Sanders’ cost estimates “preposterous.” “At least before he was honest about it!” (Mason and Pearce, 12/19)

BERNIE SANDERS, on Biden's proposed health care plan: “Under Joe’s plan we retain essentially the status quo.” JOE BIDEN: “That’s not true.” (Alonso-Zaldivar, 12/19)

Sanders, turning and pointing directly at Biden, retorted: “It is exactly true. You asked me how we are going to pay for [the plan]? … Under Medicare for All, that family will be paying $1,200 a year because we're eliminating the profiteering of the drug companies and the insurance companies and ending this byzantine and complex administration of thousands of separate health care plans.” Raising his voice above the moderators, Biden yelled, “I’m the only guy who hasn’t interrupted. I’m going to interrupt now.” The exchange then escalated to the point that Klobuchar, who was called on next to speak, jumped in saying, “Whoa, guys, hey!" Klobuchar dismissed both Sanders’ and Biden’s arguments, saying bluntly, “This fight that you guys are having isn't real. Your fight, Bernie, is not with me or with Vice President Biden. It is with all those bunch of those new House members.”’ (Bice, Cammarata and Weaver, 12/20)

Ms. Klobuchar couched a disagreement with the Sanders single-payer health care proposal by saying that as president, she’d work to enact his legislation cracking down on the pharmaceutical companies. And Mr. Biden offered no real retort when Mr. Sanders brought up the former Delaware senator’s vote to authorize the Iraq war. The only people onstage who challenged Mr. Sanders were the moderators, by pushing him on questions about race, transgender rights, whether a woman should be president and if his health care proposal is realistic. (Epstein and Goldmacher, 12/19)

"At least before, he was honest about it, that it was going to increase personal taxes," Biden interjected. "That's right, we are going to increase personal taxes," Sanders snapped back. "But we're eliminating premiums. We're eliminating copayments. We're eliminating deductibles. We're eliminating all out of pocket expenses, and no family in America will spend more than $200 a year on prescription drugs." (Norvell, Coltrain, Opsahl, Akin and Morin, 12/20)

Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren pitched her own plan to move Americans to a Medicare-for-all system, which includes transitional steps under which she vowed millions would be covered but private insurance would not immediately be eliminated. An opponent of Medicare for all, Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, pointed out that the vitriol with which the Democratic candidates are attacking each other on healthcare could ultimately harm efforts to get more Americans covered. She noted that there is limited appetite in Congress, including among Democrats, for the plan Sanders champions. (Halper, 12/19)

In the final debate of the year, Democrats argued that regardless of low unemployment rates and other positive signs for the economy, too many working families have been left behind, struggling to afford medical bills and other costs. “Ordinary people are not growing,” said Mr. Biden, who has led in national polls throughout the race. “They’re not happy with where they are.” (Thomas, McCormick and Jamerson, 12/19)

When the topic in the Democratic debate turned to immigration, the candidates uniformly pilloried President Trump’s agenda of dramatically accelerating detainments and deportations. But one candidate went further. South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg pledged that he would work to remedy the damage done to families separated at the border by providing payments to the children and moving them to the front of the line for American citizenship. (Halper, 12/19)

Before the Pete pile-on occurred, the PBS NewsHour/POLITICO debate at Loyola Marymount University was characterized by a policy-heavy first half devoted to a series of issues that hadn’t received much attention in the previous five Democratic debates. (Lizza, 12/20)

Kaiser Health News: Democrats Debate Whether ‘Medicare For All’ Is ‘Realistic’

But with six Democratic debates to go in the primary season, the candidates also waded into topics that focused more on care: the startling racial disparities in maternal mortality rates and the treatment of those with disabilities. Andrew Yang, a businessman who is mostly running on his proposal to institute a universal basic income of $1,000 a month, noted that black women are 320% more likely to die in childbirth. That disparity has prompted calls to extend Medicaid coverage, ensuring many new moms are not kicked off their health care shortly after giving birth. (Huetteman, 12/20)

The nearly all-white lineup of candidates at the first Democratic presidential debate in California on Thursday won’t reflect the state’s racial and ethnic diversity. But viewers can still hope for questions about issues that resonate with residents of the world’s fifth-largest economy. (Garofoli, 12/19)

“They should have a fast track to citizenship because what the United States did under this president to them was wrong,” the South Bend, Indiana, mayor said Thursday night. “We have a moral obligation to make right what was broken.” It’s not the first time that Buttigieg has discussed offering reparations for family separations: At a town hall in Iowa last month, he told voters that the US “owes something to kids in that situation” and should try to “make things right.” (Narea, 12/19)

Biden didn't dominate the debate, and, at times, he faded from view, but that's something of a win for him. The steadier he is, the fewer of Biden's supporters — and potential supporters — will be wringing their hands. (Montanaro, 12/20)

2020 Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren gives a strong retort when asked about her age at the PBS NewsHour/POLITICO debate. (12/20)

Democratic presidential candidates met for the final debate of 2019 Thursday in Los Angeles. Below is a transcript of what they said. (12/20)

Sheila Morrison was in Canada when she fell into her third diabetic coma. "My 90-year-old cousin thought we had a lunch date, and so she came with her daughter to pick me up," she says. "And I wouldn't answer the door." Her visitors were able to get inside and called an ambulance when they found her. Morrison remained in the coma for about a week. "When I woke up, they told me that another hour, too, and I wouldn't have survived," she recalls. (Blanchard and Shapiro, 12/19)

If you want to understand each major Democratic candidate’s theory of how they could win the nomination, look at their health care platform. Former Vice President Joe Biden is selling himself as the palatable moderate, pitching a public option that builds on Obamacare. South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg has a more progressive frame for his similar plan: Medicare-for-all who want it. Sen. Bernie Sanders, meanwhile, repeats that he “wrote the damn” Medicare-for-all bill in the Senate and presents himself as the only candidate actually committed to single-payer health insurance. (Scott, 12/19)