In debate, Democratic candidates differ on role in Syria

MANCHESTER, N.H. — The Democratic presidential candidates strongly disagreed about the U.S. role in the Middle East during their debate in New Hampshire.

After extraordinary success early in his campaign, Bernie Sanders has not had many breaks lately. The senator from Vermont looked for a big one Saturday night in his next-door state, New Hampshire.

With a greater focus on foreign affairs and terrorism, the campaign issues have moved away from his areas of strength, and his growth in the polls has stalled as he urgently tries to gain on former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Sanders, in recent weeks, has seemed frustrated with the focus on the Middle East and the fight against the Islamic State militants in Iraq and Syria. But early in Saturday's debate he staked out that issue as a key distinction between himself and Clinton.

Sanders: Coalition needed

'I worry,' he said, that 'Secretary Clinton is too much into regime change and a little bit too aggressive without knowing what the unintended consequences might be' of military action in the Mideast.

The U.S. should seek a coalition against Islamic State, or ISIS, that would include Russia, Sanders said. To keep the focus on that fight, the U.S. should set aside its insistence that Syrian President Bashar Assad leave power, he said.

'It is not Assad that is attacking the United States. It is ISIS,' he said. The U.S. 'cannot be the policeman of the world.'

Clinton sharply disagreed.

'Assad has killed, by last count, about 250,000 Syrians,' she said, and the civil war caused by his government's actions is 'the reason we're in the mess we're in.'

'I wish it could be either-or,' she said. But she added that the U.S. should work on both tracks — fighting Islamic State and opposing Assad — to be effective. The Sunni Arab fighters that the U.S. wants to work with all oppose Assad and want to remove him from power, she noted.

Clinton: Don't let Iran in

'If the United States does not lead, there is not another leader — there is a vacuum,' she said. She also suggested that Sanders' approach would lead to greater involvement in Syria by Iran, Assad's ally.

More involvement by Iran would be 'like asking the arsonist to pour more gasoline on the fire,' she said.

Voter-files snooping

Before that exchange, however, Sanders was prodded to apologize for the latest unexpected development to complicate his campaign — a crisis that erupted Friday over snooping by Sanders' since-fired digital director into confidential voter files that Clinton's campaign had stored in a Democratic National Committee database.

'I recognize it is a problem,' Sanders said of the digital snooping, and admitted, 'Our staff did the wrong thing.'

He also complained that Democratic Party officials had treated his campaign too roughly in response.

Clinton, in response, said, 'We should move on, because I don't think the American people are all that interested in this,' Clinton said.

Vital ground for Sanders

Sanders holds a slight lead in New Hampshire, according to several polls, even as he has been losing ground in Iowa, which holds the first nominating contest Feb. 1. His campaign is working fiercely to hang on to its edge here, where early polls are notoriously volatile. Former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley, who shared the stage Saturday night with Clinton and Sanders, is far back in the polls.

When Sanders launched his bid, voters were almost singularly focused on the economy. His theme has been an unapologetic economic populism and crusade against Wall Street.

The Sanders pitch still resonates with the party's liberal wing. But he's been less successful at handling the issue that now dominates the race: national security. After the attacks in Paris and then San Bernardino, Calif., Clinton embraced the challenge with gusto. She laid out detailed proposals in speeches.

The debates have done little to change the contours of the race. Clinton was up by more than 20 points in national polling averages leading up to last month's debate in Iowa. In the weeks following, she still was up by more than 20 points, as she is now.