Who Won Thursday's Democratic Debate? Hillary Clinton Tries to Bury Bernie Sanders in Brooklyn

BROOKLYN, NY — Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders squared off Thursday night in Brooklyn in advance of next week's 2016 Democratic presidential primary vote in New York, often shouting over CNN moderators and a rowdy audience at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. More context and background on Thursday's much-anticipated Brooklyn debate is available here.

Patch's New York City editor, Simone Wilson, live-blogged the debate. Her play-by-play and analysis, below.

9 p.m.

Bernie's hair is just mussed enough tonight to give him that *wacky Brooklyn uncle* edge, without spilling over into mad-scientist territory. Hillary's looking pretty fresh, too, in that lab coat thing and chunky beads. Also admirable: Both candidates manage never to look each other in the eyes through the opening theatrics — even when they're forced to shake hands, and when they're forced to thank each other during opening remarks. Two weeks of hard campaigning in New York City will do that to a politician.

9:10 p.m.

All the big personal issues between these two in NYC are being aired out in the first 10 minutes. Hillary brings up Sanders' "unqualified" remark and his messy New York Daily News interview. Bernie retreats a bit on the "unqualified" thing, but fires back by calling Hillary's vote on the Iraq war part of the "worst foreign policy blunder in the modern history of this country." He realizes he'll have to fight this fight Hillary-style, or he's going under.

9:15 p.m.

CNN’s Dana Bash isn't going to let the Daily News interview fade from the conversation so fast. Bernie fumbles his response — not quite as badly as he did in Daily News offices, but he still can't provide a concrete plan for breaking up banks. And he stumbles over his words at least twice. Clearly, Bernie was nervous about this question coming up tonight.

Hillary gloats. "I love being in Brooklyn. This is great," she says, taking a moment to smile and survey the crowd.

9:20 p.m.

Apparently realizing that Hillary has no intention of slowing her roll, Bernie bites back with some sarcasm. When Hillary says she has "called out" banks for their bad behavior, Bernie quips: "Senator Clinton called them out. Oh, my goodness. They must have been really crushed by this. ... They must have been very, very upset."

9:25 p.m.

Early on, tonight's debate was looking like it might end up a clear Bernie defeat. But he's beginning to tap into the charm that's carried him through the primaries so far, against all odds. When Hillary basically refuses to release transcripts of her closed-door, top-dollar speeches at Wall Street events, Bernie promises to make public his 2014 tax returns as early as tomorrow — but warns the American people not to get too excited. "They're very boring," he says, to laughter from the crowd.

9:35 p.m.

Things get so nasty as Bernie and Hillary debate their respective stances on raising the minimum wage that Wolf Blitzer has to intervene. "If you're both screaming at each other, the viewers won't be able to hear either of you," he says.

9:45 p.m.

Both Hillary and the moderators dig into Bernie on gun rights and gun control, which Hillary clearly sees as the only chink in Bernie's ultra-liberal platform. But Bernie sticks it right back to her, questioning her support of that controversial 1994 crime bill and calling her use of the word "superpredator," at the time, "racist."

10:05 p.m.

Bernie and Hillary both want credit for being the most environmentally friendly Democratic candidate. As Secretary of State, Hillary says, she played a central role in bringing the nations of the world together to address climate change.

Bernie's response: "When you were Secretary of State, you also worked very hard to expand fracking all over the world."

Hillary pretty much avoids that dig and goes back to emphasizing her close work with President Obama on climate change. "I'm getting a little bit concerned here," she says, "because I really believe the president has done an incredible job against all odds and deserves credit."

So Bernie mentions the only person Democrats love more than Obama: the Pope. As we've learned from the Pope, Bernie says, the world is facing a "global crisis" that Hillary and Obama's "incrementalism" won't fix.

10:10 p.m.

Uh-oh. Foreign policy time.

10:15 p.m.

Hillary clearly thinks she has this portion of the debate on lock. (Need we be reminded, again, of Bernie's Daily News disaster.) She ticks off some of her accomplishments in the Middle East — mostly in Libya. That's where Bernie jumps in. He criticizes America's — and Hillary's, in her role as Secretary of State — reputation for constantly, and often disastrously, opting for regime change in the region.

We've been "sucked into perpetual warfare in that region," Bernie says.

10:25 p.m.

CNN's Wolf Blitzer — who, it should be noted, is very pro-Israel himself — wants to know if Bernie thinks Israel has a right to defend itself, given his recent comments on Israel's 2014 attack on Gaza. Bernie's response is bold: "Was that a disproportionate attack? Yes, I believe it was."

Bernie corrects his death-toll data on the 2014 war, which he'd totally botched in the Daily News interview. He also calls himself "someone who is 100 percent pro-Israel," but says: "We are going to have to treat the Palestinian people with respect and dignity." This statement gets the largest applause of the night so far.

When it's her turn, Hillary brags about her resume some more. "I negotiated the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in November of 2012. ... I flew all night. I got there. I negotiated that," she says.

"They do not invite rockets raining down on their towns and villages," she adds, defending the small Jewish nation.

Bernie's cutting response: "That is not the issue. You evaded the question. ... Was their response disproportionate? I believe that it was. You have not answered that."

"I think I did answer it," she says, then rants on Hamas some more, without really answering it.

10:35 p.m.

By the end of the Israel-Palestine argument, Hillary's strategy tonight is clear: Call out Bernie for having big ideas without any real plan of action behind them. Or, in her own words, indirectly aimed at Bernie: "Describing the problem is a lot easier than trying to solve it."

10:40 p.m.

Hillary is really running with this theme now. She calls Bernie's plan to offer free universal college education and health care in America delusional, even "catastrophic."

Bernie's not backing down, though. Give him dreams or give him death. "Please don't tell me that we cannot do what many other countries around the world are doing," he says.

10:50 p.m.

Finally, Hillary and Bernie find something to agree on: Republican obstructionism in Congress totally sucks. "It really is an outrage," Bernie says. Hillary's not arguing.

And she uses this moment of peace to break out of the back-and-forth, calling out Republican presidential candidates (Trump, mostly) for their attacks on women — as well as tonight's moderators, for not asking more questions about women's rights.

10:55 p.m.

Bernie defends himself against accusations that he's not a true-blue Democrat, and that he's raised no money for the party. "The future of the party is not simply... raising money from wealthy campaign contributors," he says. Instead, Bernie says, he wants to get young people and other average Americans involved.

When Bernie shouts over a CNN moderator to point out — for the second time tonight — that the average contribution to his campaign has been just $27, the crowd breaks into a chant. "Bernie! Bernie!"

"I think we're going to win this nomination, to tell you the truth," Bernie says. Hillary isn't smirking, like she usually does when Bernie says something she finds outrageous.

11 p.m.

Indeed: "I'm not taking anything for granted," Hillary says, waxing humble. She promises to "work her heart out" to win the primary election in New York State and beyond.

The candidates' "final pitches" are coming up, Wolf Blitzer says as CNN cuts to its last commercial break of the night.

11:05 p.m.

Bernie goes first. He talks about his parents, working-class Polish immigrants who achieved the American dream in South Brooklyn when he was a kid. He drives home his central campaign promise — to hold the rich responsible — and says he's confident that "millions of people" will "stand up, fight back and create a government that works for all of us, not just the 1 percent." The crowd responds with another "Bernie" chant that lasts an almost awkward length of time.

11:10 p.m.

Hillary spends her entire closing speech reviewing her accomplishments as New York's representative in the U.S. Senate. "I'm asking for your support again in the primary on Tuesday," she says, promising to "work my heart out for you again."

And for her final line, Hillary invokes her theme of the night: "We won't just make promises we can't keep," she says. "We will deliver results that will improve the lives of the people in New York and in America."

Finally, as CNN cuts away from the candidates and fades to a room of pundits, we hear one last cry of "Bernieeee" from a member of the audience.