Pete Buttigieg claims anti-Sanders mantle, wants Bloomberg out of the race

Pete Buttigieg’s campaign said Thursday that he emerged from the Las Vegas debate as the strongest alternative to beat the far-left front-runner, Sen. Bernard Sanders, unless billionaire media mogul Michael Bloomberg mucks it up.

The memo circulated by the Buttigieg campaign warned that Mr. Bloomberg’s poor debate performance Wednesday proved he can’t beat Mr. Sanders but would propel the avowed socialist toward the Democratic presidential nomination and likely defeat by President Trump in November.

“If Bloomberg remains in the race despite showing he can not offer a viable alternative to Bernie Sanders, he will propel Sanders to a seemingly insurmountable delegate lead siphoning votes away from Pete, the current leader in delegates,” the memo said.

The Buttigieg memo echoed a similar note from the Bloomberg campaign before the debate that called on the other more moderate candidates in the race to drop out and clear the way for Mr. Bloomberg to beat Mr. Sanders, an independent senator from Vermont who caucuses with the Democrats.

Mr. Bloomberg then suffered a severe beatdown on the debate stage, where he failed to effectively fend off charges that he harasses women, conceals his tax returns and as New York City mayor championed racist police tactics.

“If the dynamics of the race did not dramatically change, Democrats could end up coming out of Super Tuesday with Bernie Sanders holding a seemingly insurmountable delegate lead,” the Buttigieg campaign warned. “However, coming out of last night, it’s clear that Pete Buttigieg is the strongest alternative to defeat Bernie Sanders.”

Indeed, Mr. Buttigieg can lay claim to a narrow first-place finish over Mr. Sanders in the Iowa caucuses and a close second-place finish behind Mr. Sanders in the New Hampshire primary.

The Nevada caucuses on Saturday will test Mr. Buttigieg’s momentum. He trails in fourth place in the Real Clear Politics average of recent Nevada polls.

Though Mr. Buttigieg again proved his debate mettle on the stage in Las Vegas, he still faces competition in the race’s more-moderate contenders: Mr. Bloomberg, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden and Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, whose far-left run faltered, also has now moved to position herself to the right of Mr. Sanders.

The jockeying to become the alternative to Mr. Sanders has sparked fear in the party establishment of a drawn-out primary race in which the more-moderate vote is divided and Mr. Sanders remains the frontrunner, potentially remaking the Democratic Party in socialist style.

Mr. Buttigieg, the openly gay former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, argues that he is the antidote to the Sanders revolution.

“In last night’s debate, Pete was the only candidate who focused on and was able to draw a sharp contrast with Sanders. And he decisively made the case that Sanders’ polarizing vision was too great a risk to put up against Donald Trump,” said the memo.

All of his rivals make similar claims to being the most electable. But the raucous debate in Las Vegas raised doubts about most of the contenders, with Mr. Biden at times rambling and Ms. Klobuchar appearing flustered when challenged by Mr. Buttigieg.