Warren's campaign says she 'took heat' during debate because she's ahead in the polls


Sen. Elizabeth Warren's (D-Mass.) campaign knows exactly why several of her fellow 2020 Democratic presidential candidates went after her during Tuesday's debate.
Warren has "built momentum by running a campaign of substance, identifying problems facing the country, and laying out her plans for big structural change to fix them," spokeswoman Kristen Orthman told CNN. "She took heat tonight as a result of that momentum, but she stayed focused on what's broken and how she plans to fix it with a government and an economy that works for the people. That's how Elizabeth will win the nomination, beat Donald Trump, and make big, structural change."
A frontrunner in many polls, Warren was targeted by, among other candidates, South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg, who said she had "no plan" for how to pay for Medicare-for-all, and former Vice President Joe Biden, who was not happy that Warren wouldn't give him credit for helping get votes for her Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
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