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The Democratic candidates for president will debate for the final time this year on Saturday night, bringing leading contenders Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders face-to-face for the first time since a dust-up over voter information roiled the race.
The spat was set off this week when Sanders staffers improperly accessed information gathered by Clinton s campaign after a computer glitch in a database managed by the Democratic National Committee, drawing criticism from Clinton aides. The incident added an unexpected twist to the contest ahead of the prime-time set-to, which had been poised to focus on foreign policy and national security.
Unlike the crowded 14-candidate Republican field, which was divvied up into two debates Tuesday in Las Vegas, just a trio of Democratic hopefuls remain in the mix.
Clinton, a former secretary of state; Sanders, a senator from Vermont; and Martin O Malley, a former Maryland governor and long-shot candidate, will take the stage at Saint Anselm College in Manchester, New Hampshire, at 8 p.m. ABC News and the New Hampshire Union Leader are sponsoring the Democratic debate, which will be the third of the campaign.
The debate comes as Clinton holds a wide national lead over Sanders.
A Washington Post-ABC News poll released this week showed Clinton ahead of Sanders, 59 percent to 28 percent, on par with her standing a month ago. O Malley lagged behind at just 5 percent.
The contest in the early states is closer, although Clinton has bolstered her standing in those places lately. Clinton led Sanders 48 percent to 39 percent in a recent Iowa poll conducted for the Des Moines Register and Bloomberg Politics.
A Franklin Pierce University and Boston Herald poll of New Hampshire showed them running neck-and-neck.
The race took a sharp detour Thursday when DNC officials accused the Sanders campaign of improperly accessing confidential voter information gathered by Clinton s team. Sanders campaign manager Jeff Weaver said a staffer was fired over the matter, which he blamed on a software error caused by a vendor hired by the DNC.
On Friday, tensions escalated. Weaver accused the DNC of trying to help Clinton, and the Sanders campaign filed a lawsuit against the DNC for suspending its access to key voter information after the incident.
Early Saturday, the DNC and Sanders issued statements saying that his access had been restored, though each side used tough language to talk about the other.
Meanwhile, Clinton aides expressed deep concerns about the Sanders campaign accessing the information.
This was a very egregious breach, and our data was stolen. This was not an inadvertent glimpse into our data, said Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook.
After the Sanders campaign and the DNC appeared to come to terms on an arrangement, Clinton press secretary Brian Fallon issued a gentler statement, saying, We are pleased that the Sanders campaign has agreed to submit to an independent audit to determine the full extent of the intrusion its staff carried out earlier this week.
At issue is a master list of voter data that is key in targeting and fundraising efforts. The DNC rents it out to campaigns, which add their own proprietary information.
The vendor that maintains the list said a computer error on Wednesday briefly allowed the campaigns to review information they would not normally be able to see.
Sanders, who is running as a Democratic socialist laser focused on income inequality, is trying to make up ground in the race against Clinton ahead of the first nominating contest in Iowa on Feb.
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Clinton looked vulnerable earlier this year amid an uproar over her use of a personal email account during her time as the nation s chief diplomat. But in recent weeks, she has steadied her campaign, emphasizing her positions on national security and running hard against the Republican field on national security.
Sanders on Thursday won the endorsement of the 700,000-member Communications Workers of America, a rare blow to Clinton s powerful army of organized labor supporters.
National security is expected to be a major focus in Saturday s debate, given this month s deadly terrorist attack in San Bernardino, California, and Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump s call to temporarily ban Muslims from entering the country over concerns about future attacks.
Sanders and Clinton took to social media Saturday morning to try to gin up support in advance of the debate.
I ve said it since day one: I can t do it alone. Join the conversation, Sanders tweeted, along with the hashtag DebateWithBernie.
Clinton retweeted a message from New Hampshire supporters urging followers to tweet using a hashtag including New Hampshire s area code, 603forHRC.
John Wagner, Abby Phillip, Rosalind S.
Helderman and Anne Gearan contributed to this report.
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