Biden, Buttigieg trade jabs ahead of New Hampshire primary 

Tensions between former Vice President Joe Biden and former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg escalated Sunday, two days before the New Hampshire primary, as two of the race's moderates sparred over their experience and the legacy of the Obama-Biden administration.

The comments came as the leading Democratic candidates criticized one another in televised interviews on Sunday.

Biden on Saturday said of Buttigieg: "This guy’s not a Barack Obama." He made the comments to reporters who noted that Biden, while campaigning for president in 2007, accused his then-rival Sen. Barack Obama of lacking the experience to serve as president. 

Buttigieg, appearing on CNN's "State of the Union," said of Biden: “He’s right. I'm not, and neither is he."

He continued, "Neither is any of us running for president. And this isn’t 2008. It’s 2020. And we are in a new moment, calling for a different kind of leadership. Look, we are facing the most disruptive president in modern times, and I don't think the same playbook that helped us get here is going to work against him.”

Escalation of rhetoric between the two — occupying space as the moderates in the race — comes after Buttigieg and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, an independent, came in a virtual tie in the Iowa caucuses. Biden finished in fourth place.

The Associated Press reported Sunday night that with 100% of precincts reporting it could not declare a winner and that Buttigieg led Sanders by .09 percentage points, with the Sanders campaign asking for a recanvass of the results. A recanvass is not a recount but a check of the vote count, the AP said.

Polling ahead of Tuesday's New Hampshire primary shows Sanders leading Buttigieg by a slim margin. According to a CNN tracking poll taken of voters between Wednesday and Saturday, Sanders had 28% of support, Buttigieg had 21%, followed by Biden, with 12%, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, with 9%, and Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, with 6%.

A WBZ-Boston Globe-Suffolk University poll, released late Saturday, had Sanders with 24%, followed by Buttigieg with 22%, Warren with 13%, Biden with 10%, and Klobuchar with 9%.

In an interview that aired Sunday on ABC's "This Week," Biden said that Buttigieg has "been saying that the reason we're in the problem right now is because of the recent past. That's eight years of Obama and me. I don't get that."

Biden continued, "I don't understand, when they talk about the past, why Barack was such a lousy president. I thought he was a pretty damn good president."

On Saturday, Biden released an ad on YouTube mocking Buttigieg's experience as a small-town mayor. The piece paints contrasts between the two, for instance, highlighting Biden's record of negotiating the Iran deal, while Buttigieg "negotiated lighter licensing regulations on pet chip scanners." Other Buttigieg accomplishments are highlighted in jest, from installation of decorative lights under bridges to revitalization of sidewalks in the city's downtown.

Buttigieg called the ad "a typical political attack."

He continued, "We know we might look small from the perspective of Washington, but to us it’s what's going on in Washington that looks so small and small-minded."

Buttigieg expressed further support for the Obama administration, during an interview on NBC's "Meet the Press."

"Look, I had the Obama White House's back time and time again because they were doing the right thing. And that wasn't always easy as a mayor in Indiana," Buttigieg told NBC anchor Chuck Todd. He said he defended the Obama administration's decision to bail out the auto industry, while campaigning for state office. "But those achievements were important because they met the moment. Now we're in a different moment. This is 2020."

Biden sought to downplay expectations in New Hampshire, telling ABC anchor George Stephanopoulos: "Now, let's be realistic. I think it's always going to be an uphill fight." Referencing New England Sens. Sanders and Warren, Biden said: "When you're running against two people who are neighboring senators, you know the deal. Bernie won here, the neighbor sooner, by 20 points last time. So I think it is an uphill fight. But I think it's a fight we will do well in."

Sanders took aim at Buttigieg for raising funds from corporate donors. "If you do as Mayor Buttigieg does, take huge amounts of contributions" from special interests, and Wall Street, "does anyone seriously believe that you're going to stand up to those powerful entities and represent working people?”

Buttigieg defended the practice, and said: "This is the fight of our lives. I'm not a fan of the current campaign finance system, but I'm also insistent that we have got to go into this with all of the support we can get."

Warren said on ABC that she was not dropping out anytime soon, even if the results in New Hampshire are disappointing. "We've built a campaign to go the distance, and that's what I think is going to happen here," she said.

Nearly a week after technological glitches delayed the reporting of results in the Iowa caucuses, Democratic National Committee chairman Tom Perez said on CNN that he was not stepping down. As for talk that Iowa should not be permitted to go first in the 2024 nominating cycle, Perez said: "That's the conversation that will absolutely happen after this election cycle."

By Scott Eidler

scott.eidler@newsday.com@ScottEidler

Scott Eidler is a deputy editor for the towns department at Newsday. Scott has worked at Newsday since 2012 and previously covered municipal government and education.