michael barbaro

From The New York Times, I’m Michael Barbaro. This is “The Daily.” Today: In exactly three months, the first election of the Democratic presidential primary will be held in Iowa, marking the official start of the race. Over the weekend, the party held its most important political event yet in the run-up to that election — a fabled annual dinner attended by almost every remaining candidate in the campaign. It’s a closely watched test of who exactly has the political support, financial might and organizational prowess to become the nominee. “Daily” producers Clare Toeniskoetter and Monika Evstatieva traveled to Des Moines to meet up with political correspondent Reid Epstein, who was covering the event. It’s Monday, November 4.

clare toeniskoetter

O.K. So Monika and I fly to Des Moines, not really knowing what to expect. This Liberty and Justice Celebration wasn’t supposed to start until 6:30.

clare toeniskoetter Testing. I don’t even have headphones on yet.

clare toeniskoetter

But we headed over to the venue at about 10:00 in the morning.

monika evstatieva It is 9:42 a.m. on a Friday morning in Des Moines, Iowa. It’s a bit chilly. It’s 37. Crisp morning. clare toeniskoetter Got our winter jackets on. monika evstatieva Got our winter jackets.

clare toeniskoetter

And already when we got to the main street, there’s this massive crowd of people.

crowd Party! Party! Party!

clare toeniskoetter

It’s not like any political event I’ve ever been to.

crowd Amy for America! Amy for America! Amy for America! speaker Beto, Beto, Beto! crowd Vote Yang! Vote Yang! Vote Yang!

clare toeniskoetter

So the main event is at a big sports stadium. And it’s really fitting because the whole thing feels like a college football game. But instead of two teams, there are 14.

crowd Kamala Harris fights back!

clare toeniskoetter

Fourteen Democratic presidential candidates.

crowd Kamala Harris fights back!

clare toeniskoetter

So each candidate, each team has staked out their own area. And they each have —

clare toeniskoetter Every candidate has a color, right? speaker Yeah, he’s black and white. I’ve got my Beto sweatshirt on underneath.

clare toeniskoetter

— their own color. Beto O’Rourke is black and white. Cory Booker is red. Elizabeth Warren is a sort of sea foam green that her team branded as “liberty green.” And some of her supporters are dressed up like the Statue of Liberty.

[drumming]

clare toeniskoetter

They also have their own music. There are competing marching bands —

[music]

clare toeniskoetter

— some better than others. And at one point, some upbeat supporters are doing this choreographed dance in the street. The whole thing just has this vibe of a big tailgate. Snacks, people sharing hand warmers. And Monika and I go around and start talking to people at these various camps.

speaker Hi clare toeniskoetter Hi. speaker How are you doing? clare toeniskoetter Good. Why are you here? speaker I am here to follow Andrew around the country like I’ve been doing since March. monika evstatieva So what’s the excitement all about? What’s happening? speaker 1 Pete. Pete. He is the most inspiring candidate, the smartest, the most everything candidate I have ever seen. I have not been this inspired in my entire life. And I would go anywhere and do anything for Pete and Chasten. speaker 2 Why I’m here? Well, I’m here to support Joe because I think that he’s the best chance for the Democrats to beat President Trump. speaker 3 I’m here to support Beto O’Rourke. We’ve got lots of giant banners and lots of big signs and all kinds of exciting things that we plan to do inside. So it’s going to be crazy. speaker 4 I am campaigning for Elizabeth Warren. She’s been my favorite forever. speaker 5 Bernie is our man. He was my man in 2016. He’s still my man. We dispel the myth of the “Bernie Bros.” I say we are the “Silver Sanders Sisters.”

clare toeniskoetter

So technically, this as a fundraiser for the Democratic Party in Iowa. And there are two ways that people can go. Big donors can pay for dinner and have special reserved seats on the floor at the event. And then candidates also buy groups of tickets that they give to their supporters for free. Those people don’t get the fancy dinner. But they do get to go sit in the stadium and cheer for their candidate. Because the way this works, every candidate goes up on the stage in the middle of the dinner floor. Their face is on the Jumbotron. And they give a 12-minute speech, one after another. And all these supporters are like their giant cheering squads. So it’s a fundraiser. But because it’s the last time all the candidates will be at the same event ahead of the Iowa caucus, it’s become something bigger than that. It’s a test of who has momentum. And it’s gotten even more significant since 2007.

clare toeniskoetter And why Iowa? What’s important about this state? speaker Well, I mean, obviously, it’s pretty important in terms of the election and the primary. And I think we’re trying to duplicate the excitement that the Obama campaign had.

clare toeniskoetter

Lots of people I talked to mention what happened —

speaker Barack Obama won the presidency in 2007 because —

clare toeniskoetter

— with Obama.

speaker This is actually important because Barack Obama got his big start in Iowa at this dinner.

clare toeniskoetter

He was lagging behind Hillary Clinton. And then he gave this rousing speech at this dinner. Back then, it was called the Jefferson-Jackson dinner. And it gave his campaign this huge surge. And he went on to win Iowa and then, of course, the Democratic nomination. So that’s the dream of how this goes. And one candidate in particular seems to be hoping to recreate that moment —

speaker Mayor Pete all the way.

clare toeniskoetter

— Pete Buttigieg. He’s been focusing a ton of his campaign’s energy and resources on Iowa in recent weeks. And on Friday morning, The Times actually released a poll showing that he was polling third in Iowa and actually polling above Joe Biden. And so you can feel this particular energy with his campaign and his supporters. The biggest turnout seems to be for him and for Elizabeth Warren.

speaker Bernie is not taking part in the D.N.C.‘s fundraiser. And we came from Michigan to support Bernie.

clare toeniskoetter

The Bernie Sanders supporters are kind of complicated, because they’re not actually going into the event.

speaker He’s uncorrupted. All the others take corporate money.

clare toeniskoetter

They say it because of its connection to corporate sponsors and their complicated relationship with the D.N.C. And then there’s Beto O’Rourke.

clare toeniskoetter What just happened? speaker I got a news alert. And it says, U.S. Democratic presidential hopeful Beto O’Rourke announces he’s ending his campaign.

clare toeniskoetter

While we’re out in the crowds that afternoon, interacting with Beto supporters, he announces that he’s dropping out of the race and won’t be speaking at the dinner. So just like that, 14 teams becomes 13. And we go to meet up with Reid outside the arena.

reid epstein Hey. How are you? clare toeniskoetter Good. Hi. reid epstein I feel like we should hug. clare toeniskoetter I know. But it’s hard with a mic. monika evstatieva Hello! reid epstein So welcome to Iowa. Right now we’re watching a parade of Pete Buttigieg supporters dressed in yellow and blue. There’s about 2,000 of them. And they are marching up 3rd Street here in Des Moines. They have bells. They’re generally making a lot of noise. monika evstatieva O.K. Let’s go see what happens. reid epstein All right. clare toeniskoetter Cool.

michael barbaro

We’ll be right back.

clare toeniskoetter

Reid, what happens when this dinner actually starts?

reid epstein

So you walk in. The arena that it was in is the minor league basketball and hockey arena here in Des Moines. So it seats about 16,000 people. Each campaign’s supporters had decorated their section. So there were rings of signs around the different levels with the candidates’ names on them. We were sitting about four stories above the floor. And on the floor of the arena were several dozen tables arranged almost like a very large wedding party —

clare toeniskoetter What are you looking at? reid epstein I see like Cory Booker is mingling on the floor. And I can’t tell who he’s with. It looks like it might be Chris Dodd, who ran for president here in 2008. But it’s kind of far away. So it’s hard to tell.

reid epstein

— with black-clad busboys running around and people in suits sort of sitting around at the table. These were the fat cats, the big donors. And in the seats above that were people in T-shirts, the supporters of the candidates who had gotten free tickets from the campaigns. And it was a real difference between the different groups of people.

speaker Ladies and gentlemen, please find your seats. Our program will be beginning shortly.

reid epstein

There’s an elevated stage in the middle of the floor with four smoke machines on each corner, a long walkway that the candidates use to come in and out to get to the stage. And above it is the giant video board Jumbotron.

reid epstein Mayor Pete is about to come out. On the video board are pictures of him and his husband, along with a photo of him from when he was in the military.

reid epstein

And then we got to what people were waiting for, which was the candidates. And the first one up was Pete Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Indiana.

reid epstein This is “High Hopes” by Panic! at the Disco.

reid epstein

All the candidates pick walk on songs. And Buttigieg’s is “High Hopes” from Panic! at the Disco, which is very catchy. It’s like bum, bum, bum, ba, ba, bah. That song came on. The 2,000 or so people who came for Buttigieg start screaming.

reid epstein His supporters are in some choreographed light dancing thing, all blinking at once. pete buttigieg Thank you, Iowa. Thank you, Iowa Democratic Party. reid epstein It’s also a rare event where Buttigieg is wearing a suit jacket. Usually he comes out in just a blue tie and a white shirt. So you know it’s a serious event for him that he’s put a coat on.

reid epstein

So that leads right into his speech.

pete buttigieg The first time I came to this state was as a volunteer to knock on doors for a presidential candidate, a young man with a funny name. And we knew the stakes were high then. The stakes are colossal now.

reid epstein

He talks about looking out the window of his office in South Bend and seeing kind of the decaying Midwest making a comeback.

pete buttigieg My office is about six hours that way down I-80. And out the window of that office, I see the outlines of our ethanol plant, which is why I understand the measure of this president’s betrayal of American farmers. And I know how to talk about it.

reid epstein

He contrasts himself with President Trump.

pete buttigieg And I don’t have to throw myself a military parade to see what a convoy looks like. Because I was driving one around Afghanistan right about the time this president was taping season seven of “The Celebrity Apprentice.” So that tough talk’s not going to work against me.

reid epstein

And he speaks about going hunting with his husband’s father in Michigan over Thanksgiving weekend.

pete buttigieg In rural Michigan, you cannot stop a man from going deer hunting with his husband’s father.

reid epstein

And only at the end, in the last couple minutes, does he get to the real meat and potatoes of what he’s talking about —

pete buttigieg But I also will not tire from the effort to include everyone in this future we are trying to build — progressives, moderates and Republicans of conscience who are ready for a change. The time has come.

reid epstein

— which is the contrast with Elizabeth Warren.

pete buttigieg We will fight when we must fight.

reid epstein

So Warren’s big theme in this race is that she is a fighter, and she is going to fight for the big progressive causes.

pete buttigieg But I will never allow us to get so wrapped up in the fighting that we start to think fighting is the point. The point is what lies on the other side of the fight.

reid epstein

He is saying, she alienates other people.

pete buttigieg So Iowa, are you ready to bring this country together? [cheering] pete buttigieg Then let us make history together. And we will have a lot to celebrate in November of next year. And we will know where to go from there. Thank you, Iowa. Thank you, Democrats. Thank you so much. reid epstein Buttigieg just finished. For people in this room who have been paying attention to this caucus and the campaign, that’s about Elizabeth Warren, whose campaign is to have the fight and take the fight to the people who she believes have caused the problems in the country. Buttigieg is telling a different story, talking about bringing people together from outside the core elements of the party. [music] reid epstein The campaign anthem from 2012. monika evstatieva O.K., now we have Joe Biden. clare toeniskoetter Biden’s up.

reid epstein

So Biden walks out. And he’s immediately at a disadvantage, because some of the sections that his campaign had reserved are mostly empty.

joe biden Hello, Iowa Democrats. Let me get right to it. There’s a couple of things I’ve learned in the last couple of weeks. Number one is that Vladimir Putin doesn’t want me to be president. And number two, Donald Trump doesn’t want me to be the nominee.

reid epstein

He launches into the big theme of his campaign, which is he is the most electable.

joe biden And we must beat him. And I will beat him like a drum if I’m your nominee. And he knows it. He knows it. Folks, look.

reid epstein

And then he pivots almost immediately into an attack on Elizabeth Warren.

joe biden We can do this. We can do it quickly without taxing the middle class. We can make sure that the 160 million people who have health insurance they like can keep it if they want. And if not, they can buy in to a Medicare-like proposal. Ladies and gentlemen, that will not take four years or five years or 10 years to happen. It will happen immediately. Immediately.

reid epstein

You know, it landed with less enthusiasm than what we saw from Buttigieg, in part because he had far fewer people, but also because Joe Biden isn’t somebody who is lighting these big rooms of activists on fire. The rationale for the Biden campaign is much more about winning over casual voters or people who are not spending six hours on a Friday night at these events, people who are going to go vote, but less activist.

joe biden So ladies and gentlemen, get up. Remember who we are. Let’s take this country back and began to lead the world again. Thank you.

reid epstein

So the next leading candidate to come out was Elizabeth Warren.

speaker Please welcome Senator Elizabeth Warren. reid epstein “9 to 5” is playing. Her crowd has some sort of green lights and flags they’re waving around.

reid epstein

Her people jump up and cheer. They’re waving flags.

reid epstein There’s a lot of waving.

reid epstein

They have a giant Elizabeth Warren banner that comes down through several sections of the arena. And her people cheered so loudly and for such an extended amount of time that her time to speak started counting down. And she had to turn to them and with palms down, encourage them to kind of cut it out so that she could begin her speech.

elizabeth warren O.K. O.K. Hello, Iowa.

reid epstein

And then once she did, it was as if she had planned this all along to be a rebuttal to Buttigieg and Biden.

elizabeth warren A lot of people are afraid of big structural change. Afraid because they’re already rich and powerful, and they may lose influence. Afraid because they see an America where they won’t be able to make the changes they need.

reid epstein

And she said —

elizabeth warren Well, not me.

reid epstein

— not me.

elizabeth warren I believe in change, and I know we can get it done.

reid epstein

I believe in change, and I know we can get it done. So that was kind of the setup for her speech. And later there was a section where she really stuck the knife in them.

elizabeth warren Any one who comes on this stage and tells you they can make change without a fight is not going to win that fight. 2020 is our time in history. Our time to dream big, fight hard, and win. reid epstein Wow. I have not heard Elizabeth Warren go so hard at Buttigieg and Biden and their ideas of almost all the way to there to where she and Bernie Sanders are as she did tonight. This was sort of a new frontier for her. She’s telling the 12,000 or 13,000 people here that they’ll lose if they nominate somebody who is not fully invested in the most progressive ideas.

reid epstein

And later in the night, Bernie Sanders came on stage.

speaker Please welcome Senator Bernie Sanders.

reid epstein

And there’s a lectern waiting for him. Unlike everyone else who paced the stage and pointed and gestured to their supporters, he stood at the lectern with prepared notes on paper that he had rolled up in his suit jacket and gave his speech.

bernie sanders Good evening, Iowa Democrats.

reid epstein

Part of that was Bernie Sanders did not bring any supporters to this event. And instead, had a march across town in the rain.

bernie sanders Tonight, all of us, no matter what candidate we are supporting, are in agreement that we must defeat the most dangerous president in the history of our country.

reid epstein

And then he gave what anyone in that crowd would have recognized as a condensed version of the standard Bernie Sanders stump speech.

bernie sanders At a time of massive income and wealth inequality, the Democratic Party must become the party of the working class of this country.

reid epstein

It was the Bernie greatest hits, condensed into 11 and a half minutes.

clare toeniskoetter

So that’s four candidates. What about the other nine?

reid epstein

And the other candidates were still, nine months after this race started, doing a fair amount of introducing themselves to these activists and to Iowa caucus goers.

andrew yang And 11 years later, one state passed a dividend where now everyone in that state gets between $1,000 and $2,000 a year, no questions asked. And what state is that? crowd Alaska! andrew yang And how does Alaska pay for it? crowd Oil! andrew yang And what is the oil of the 21st century, Iowa? crowd Technology! andrew yang Technology, software, self-driving cars and trucks.

reid epstein

Andrew Yang talked about his universal basic income proposal.

kamala harris And I started my career fighting for the people. In fact, the first day I walked into a courtroom, I spoke five words. Kamala Harris for the people.

reid epstein

Kamala Harris talked about her career as a prosecutor.

amy klobuchar But I come from the grit of a February snowstorm in the middle of Minnesota.

reid epstein

Amy Klobuchar said that she would win big in the Midwest.

amy klobuchar I have won every race, every place, every time in the reddest of red congressional districts. cory booker Because if I am your nominee, I will inspire, engage, and ignite this nation like no other nominee can.

reid epstein

And Cory Booker talked about not criticizing other Democrats and focusing instead on President Trump.

cory booker Iowa, I see you. I love you. I see you. I love you. Together, we will rise.

reid epstein

The last two speakers of the night are John Delaney, the former congressman from Maryland, and Steve Bullock, the governor of Montana.

reid epstein Governor Steve Bullock of Montana is all that there is left. I think his people, this is the only section that’s still full. If you stand up, you can see them.

reid epstein

By the end, everyone, including the public address staff of the event, seemed to be exhausted.

speaker Please welcome to the stage Senator Cory Booker. reid epstein Wait. Oh, no. But it’s not Cory Booker. It’s Steve Bullock. Many indignities for Steve Bullock. And by the time Steve Bullock came out, much of his speech was, in fact, making jokes about how no one was still left in the audience. steve bullock Thank you for staying for the keynote speaker.

reid epstein

And by the end, there was no — you didn’t have to be trafficked, because everyone had already left.

clare toeniskoetter

It was like a big blowout game.

reid epstein

Yeah. It was a 30-point basketball game in February and not the World Series.

clare toeniskoetter That’s it. reid epstein That’s it. Congratulations. You’ve made it through.

clare toeniskoetter

And so you told us at the beginning of this event that one of the reasons that this event was so important is because it turned the tides for Obama in his favor 12 years ago, that it really shifted the momentum and then led him to winning in Iowa, getting the nomination, and becoming president. Do you think anybody had that sort of moment this year in Iowa? Or was it too difficult with 13 candidates taking the stage?

reid epstein

Well, I mean, the short answer is we’ll see. Sort of the more complicated answer is when Obama gave that speech 12 years ago, it was a pretty negative speech about Hillary Clinton. A lot of it was about why Obama was the best candidate. But a lot of it was about why Hillary Clinton was not. And the only person who sort of came out with that kind of bite tonight was Elizabeth Warren. And we’ll see whether she sustains this sort of argument about Biden and Buttigieg throughout, or whether this is a one-time-only event, whether this is kind of a new phase of the campaign for her, or whether this was something she rolled out just for tonight.

clare toeniskoetter

Reid, thank you.

reid epstein

Thank you. And we’ve spent 12 hours together today.

clare toeniskoetter

I’m sure we’ll be back February, if not sooner.

monika evstatieva

We’ll be back next month!

michael barbaro

The poll of Iowa voters likely to participate in February’s caucuses, conducted by The Times and Siena College and released on Friday, shows the top four candidates locked in an extremely tight race, with Joe Biden, the front-runner nationally, polling fourth in Iowa at 17 percent, behind Warren, who’s polling at 22 percent, Sanders at 19, and Buttigieg at 18. In an interview, Buttigieg said that the Iowa caucuses were increasingly becoming a “two-way” race between him and Warren. “The contrasts are real,” he said. “They’re substantive, respectful policy contrasts, but they’re real.” We’ll be right back. Here’s what else you need to know today.

archived recording It doesn’t get bigger than this, a public health emergency by a Supreme Court-mandated panel.

michael barbaro

Officials in India have declared a public health emergency in the country’s capital city, New Delhi, after air pollution levels reached 20 times what are considered safe. The warning came after a toxic cloud of air settled over the city, which officials blame on car emissions, construction dust, and farmers burning their crops.

archived recording (speaker 1) The fact is the people of Delhi N.C.R. can’t do anything about what’s happening right now, follow me? The only way to dodge this is to perhaps leave the city. archived recording (speaker 2) Absolutely, it’s turned into a very alarming situation.

michael barbaro