The second Democratic debate between Democratic presidential candidates was hosted on Nov. 14. The following statements were made by candidates throughout the debate, and the verdicts were decided upon by The Current staff after heavy research of reputable sources. Full transcripts of the debates can be found online on CNN.com, The Washington Post and other news sources.
- “I think that what happened when we abided by the agreement that George W. Bush made with the Iraqis to leave by 2011 is that an Iraqi army was left that had been trained and that was prepared to defend Iraq. Unfortunately, Nouri al-Maliki, the prime minister, set about decimating it. And then with the revolution against Assad — and I did early on say we needed to try to find a way to train and equip moderates very early so that we would have a better idea of how to deal with Assad because I thought there would be — extremist groups filling the vacuum.”—Hillary Clinton, on whether ISIS was underestimated
- According to factcheck.org, the Status of Forces Agreement, which former President George W. Bush signed with al-Maliki on Dec. 14, 2008, U.S. troops would be removed from Iraq by Dec. 31, 2011. The Washington Post reported that after U.S. troops left in 2011, the Iraqi army deteriorated because of corruption.
Iraq has experienced a long battle between the Sunni and Shiite people of the country. Maliki had a primarily Shiite government, and the Sunnis retaliated against it, leading to the creation of extreme protestors. One group of these protestors became known as Al Qaeda.
- VERDICT: True
- “What is important to understand is we have organizations, whether it is ISIS or Al Qaeda who do believe we should go back several thousand years, we should make women third-class citizens, that we should allow children to be sexually assaulted, that they are a danger to modern society.”—Bernie Sanders, on the term “radical Islam”
- According to CNN, ISIS has claimed that murdering, enslaving and raping women is justified by Islam. The Washington Post explained that the reasoning for this is that the jihadist group says the torture of women is a long-standing tradition. The article continued that after women are ranked by age, some younger than 13 years old, and physical attributes, they are distributed to men based on hierarchies. Multiple reports show that although ISIS claims this is part of their religion and tradition, the abuse of women is not an official part of Islamic teachings.
- VERDICT: True
- “The blueprint in Maryland that we follow was, yes, we did, in fact, raise the sales tax by a penny. And we made our public schools the best public schools in America for five years in a row with that investment. And, yes, we did ask everyone ― the top 14 percent of earners in our state to pay more in their income tax. And we were the only state to go four years without a penny’s increase to college tuition.”—Martin O’Malley, on making public college debt free
- According to Maryland.gov, during his two terms as Governor, Martin O’Malley created the fastest job growth in the region, led Maryland public schools to number one ranking of all public schools in the country for five years in a row and helped make Maryland colleges number one in ranking for keeping tuition costs down. He also made Maryland number one nationally in median income, number one in Ph.D. scientists and researchers per capita, number one in research and development and number one in women-owned businesses.
- VERDICT: True
- “There is a broad consensus. 92 percent in the most recent poll of Americans want gun safety measures.”—Hillary Clinton, on gun control
- Gallup reported that in a poll released Oct. 7 through Oct. 11 about the selling of firearms, 55 percent of participants wanted more strict laws, 11 percent wanted less strict laws and 33 percent wanted laws to stay as they are now. The poll also found that 86 percent of participants were in favor of universal background checks for gun purchases.
- VERDICT: Misleading. While the majority of poll participants did show they wanted more gun safety measures, it was not 92 percent.
- “This nation is the most powerful military in the world. We’re spending over $600 billion a year on the military. And yet significantly less than 10 percent of that money is used to be fighting international terrorism.”—Bernie Sanders, on Syrian refugees
- org reports that for the 2015 fiscal year, $598.5 billion of federal discretionary spending, the portion of the federal budget requested by the president each year, was spent on the military. The report shows that 83 percent of that money was spend on the Department of Defense, 11 percent was spent on overseas contingency operations, 3 percent was spent on nuclear weapons and associated costs, 2 percent was spent on international security and assistance, and 1 percent was spent on other defense needs.
- VERDICT: While he overstretched the amount of the budget, Sanders was correct in the amount of the money spent to fight international terrorism.
- “But two of our counties actually went to $12.80. And their county executives if they were here tonight would also tell you that it works. The fact of the matter is the more our people earn the more money they spend and the more our whole economy grows.”—Martin O’Malley, on the economy
- According to the Department of Labor, the federal minimum wage has increased 22 times since 1938, and, since that time, the real GDP of the economy has steadily increased as well. The site also says that raising the minimum wage allows families to have more money to spend on goods and services, which will stimulate local and national economic growth.
- VERDICT: True
