Mayor Pete vs. Beto: the battle is back



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Pete Buttigieg

Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg. | Sean Rayford / Getty Images

LOS ANGELES – Pete Buttigieg seemed to smother Beto O'Rourke at the start of the first presidential election, captivating the attention of viral media and multiplying in primary polls just as O'Rourke was at a standstill.

Now comes the second round, as the two young Democrats, who needed to regain a stage in the primary, began to get confused by guns.

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The niche – which aired on cable TV over the weekend and spread throughout the week – features two fresh-faced telegenics contestants facing a transition moment in their campaign. Buttigieg, which has capped national polls, is looking to run a campaign for the $ 25 million it raised in the last quarter. O'Rourke, who has very little support in the numbers, is looking to resume his mojo with a passionate crusade to stop armed violence.

Following a debate last week in which O'Rourke called for the government's mandatory takeover of assault weapons, Buttigieg was asked about CNN whether O'Rourke "was playing in the hands of Republicans ".

"Yes," replied Buttigieg.

"We have an agreement among the American people for not only universal background checks, but a majority in favor of the red flag laws, high-capacity magazines, banning the new sale of weapons." ;assault. It's a golden moment to finally do something because we've been discussing it since I was alive. Even so, this president and even Mitch McConnell claim to be at least open to reform. We know we have a moment in our hands. Let's take advantage of it to make these things happen. "

"Well, shit," O'Rourke replied a few hours later, revealing that the candidates were "triangulated, polled, polled, led by a focus group," adding that "Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell claiming to be interested by something that is literally a matter of life and death … it's just not enough. "

Then, after Trump said this week that he would not consider a bill on universal background checks passed by the House, the Texas congressman passed it.

"Exactly," said O'Rourke, questioned on Tuesday during an election visit about Trump's decision to ignore the Democrats in gun control. "And Pete even admitted that Trump was pretending, so why would you change your position or moderate your position to meet someone who claims only half way?"

Asked in South Carolina about O'Rourke's recent criticism, Buttigieg said Tuesday that he was "focused on what we could do now, because I do not think we can wait." He also stated that he "did not care" about Republicans' reaction to gun control reforms and that he "talks not only about politics, but about government" and "what we can do now. "

Buttigieg has "always" supported background checks on firearm sales, the prohibition of assault weapons and red flag laws, said the campaign spokesman, Chris Meagher.

O'Rourke is not the only Democrat to support compulsory redemptions. Kamala Harris said Monday at the Jimmy Fallon's Tonight Show that a buyout program is a "good idea", and Cory Booker supports such a proposal.

But O'Rourke is pushing hard for buyouts, and the opportunity to contrast with Buttigieg is particularly important for his campaign. O'Rourke and Buttigieg are fighting to be the choice of voters in search of a generation change. They are also young and white men who rely less on their resume than on their biographies and their appeal to the next generation.

It is unclear what effect this fight could have on their polls. According to a national poll on CNN last week, O'Rourke was 5%, while Monday's Morning Consult poll was at 4%, just one percentage point from Buttigieg. In a survey published Tuesday by the NBC and the Wall Street Journal, O'Rourke was unable to register more than 1% of the vote, while Buttigieg reached 7%.

But the back and forth can ultimately help the two candidates in their fight for oxygen in a primary dominated by the three candidates with the most votes.

"Pete has always been trying to position himself as a pragmatic progressive. … Beto became a missionary for a cause, to put an end to armed violence, which is truly admirable [but] Politics in this area, and Beto knows it, is more complicated than that, "said David Axelrod, chief strategist of President Barack Obama. "In this fight, it probably serves both ends."

It's also a reminder that "Beto was going to be the" next generation "candidate, and Pete usurped that space, so it's not surprising to see that in both directions," added Axelrod.

Looking at O'Rourke's Sparring and Buttigieg, a Democratic strategist involved in another presidential campaign, laughed: "Does not that look like Spiderman's, where the two spider-men are facing each other?"

"These are just two very similar characters who are trying to wear a very similar space in this battle," he added.

In particular, O'Rourke's supporters expressed delight at the resurgence of titles showing the name of their candidate alongside Buttigieg. Many O 'Rourke loyalists are still unhappy this spring's day when Buttigieg, mildly reprimanding O'Rourke for his habit when standing on chairs and tables, told a crowd of New Hampshire: is to stand on things, so I found this park bench here. "

And they know that slicing Buttigieg could help O'Rourke's cause now.

"The reality is that Buttigieg was thought in a layer higher than that of O 'Rourke … and it's usually very unprofitable to knock down," said Chris Lippincott, a Texas-based consultant. who ran a great PAC opposing Senator Ted. Cruz in the near miss Senate campaign O & # Rourke last year. "[But] O'Rourke has raised his idea and campaign with this policy proposal, which will force other candidates to respond. "

Representative Don Beyer (D-Va.), Who endorsed Buttigieg, said that the mayor of Indiana "is doing his best to defuse the confrontation" because "he wants to stay focused on the situation as a whole" .

"Ninety-eight percent [of the time] Pete and Beto agree, "Beyer said. "It's a difference between what's possible in the short term, the next two years and what's possible over 10 years or more."

It is also a stylistic contrast "between a mayor, whose main objective is to find concrete and specific solutions to advance the ball, and a legislator, who may express it so more ambitious, "said Austin Mayor Steve Adler, who confessed Buttigieg on his fellow Texan.

Gun control activists are divided on whether mandatory buy-back programs would be as effective as other reforms such as background checks and red flag laws. But Everytown spokesperson for Gun Safety told Fox News that although "presidential candidates are talking about a number of policies to combat gun violence in America," the audit of antecedents and a federal red flag law "must be the first priorities of the Senate".

O'Rourke drew the attention for the last time after the mass shooting at a Walmart in his hometown of El Paso, Texas, notably for his mandatory buyout proposal.

Democratic strategist Mathew Littman, a former Biden speechwriter working on gun reform issues, said Democrats should "start with the areas we agree on" on arms control on fire, including universal background checks and red flag laws.

Littman, who now supports Kamala Harris in the primary, said O'Rourke "is getting a lot of attention now that he has not had it before."

"He occupies a position in the Democratic primary a little different from all the others," said Littman, "and he benefits from it."

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