Warren shines, Buttigieg promises & Biden blunders at LGBTQ presidential forum

The first ever LGBTQ presidential candidate forum was held last night in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and 10 candidates from the seemingly endless list of Democrats running showed up. From the perspective of getting the candidates to go on record with their promises to the LGBTQ community, it was a success. As an opportunity to get in-depth responses from each of the candidates, the forum was more of a mixed bag.

A large part of the problem stemmed from restrictions that the Democratic National Committee imposed on the event. The DNC sets the ground rules for debates, and it didn’t want any other group horning in on its territory. As a result, the format was for each candidate to have a few minutes to answer an opening question (most often asked: what would you do in your first 100 days as president?). That was followed by a few questions from one of three rotating moderators.


The effect was a bit like political speed dating. You got a sense of who the candidates were, but just as it got interesting, time was up. And for some of candidates, we don’t know what they would have said since they didn’t show up. Chief among these was Bernie Sanders, who cited a scheduling conflict. But Andrew Yang, who is polling better than some of the candidates onstage, didn’t show up either.

That said, there were a few clear takeaways from the forum. One is that Elizabeth Warren is a good campaigner. Instead of answering the question about her first 100 days, she began by reading the names of 18 trans women of color who have been murdered this year. “It is time for a president of the United States of America to say their names,” Warren concluded.

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