Gov. Bill Richardson’s campaign was pleased with his showing in Sunday’s Democratic candidate debate.
Richardson “firmly established himself as the candidate with the strongest positions on the key challenges facing this country and showed that he is the most qualified to be the next president of the United States,” the campaign declared in a news release after the debate.
“The other candidates have policy positions, and Bill Richardson has real-world experience dealing with those challenges,” said David Contarino, Richardson’s campaign manager. “Tonight, he separated himself from the other candidates and showed voters in New Hampshire and across the country that he will be a strong and effective president that can bring this country together and restore America’s standing in the world.”
Reactions from political pundits were mixed.
The Albuquerque Journal spoke with three political observers. Two gave Richardson a “C+” and one gave him a “B.”
“I’m not quite sure he advanced his cause very much,” Tim Kraft of Las Cruces, who has worked on several presidential campaigns and worked in the Carter Administration, told the Journal.
“He did better than the first debate, but he needs to be more compelling and more concise in his responses,” pollster Brian Sanderoff told the newspaper.
“Richardson did above average,” New Hampshire political science professor Andrew Smith, the one who gave Richardson a “B,” told the Journal. “I don’t think anybody was a real ‘A’ tonight.”
David Yepsen, a columnist for the Des Moines Register, on the other hand, said Richardson “was practically invisible during the first half of the session.” He didn’t indicate whether he believed that was due to a poor showing by Richardson or the format of the CNN debate.
That was the only mention Richardson got in Yepsen’s column. Yepsen was kind to Richardson when most others were not after the first debate in April, writing that he gave a solid performance.
CNN’s three analysts said Richardson gave the most disappointing performance.
Richardson wasn’t mentioned in most other articles I found about the debate.
But his support is holding steady in Iowa. A new poll, out today, finds him at 10 percent, confirming similar support in three other polls conducted in May.
The newest poll, done by Public Policy Polling, was conducted May 30. It surveyed 1,238 likely Democratic caucusgoers and has a margin of error of 2.7 percent.
The poll had John Edwards leading the Democratic contenders in the important state with 31 percent. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton each had 17 percent, and Richardson was in fourth. No other candidate had more than 4 percent in the poll, and 17 percent of those surveyed were undecided.
The next round of polling, which will take the latest debate into account, should be interesting.
Update, 2:35 p.m.
I wrote Sunday evening about three New Hampshire voters interviewed after the debate. Two of them said they liked Richardson. Here’s the video:
Gov. Bill Richardson’s campaign was pleased with his showing in Sunday’s Democratic candidate debate.