Biden Warns About Disinformation After Misleading Video

Saying that “the door is open a crack” to an era of major reforms and the end of “business as usual,” she added: “Think about it — a nation that elects someone like Donald Trump is a nation that has got serious problems. Going back is not where we want to be. Our chance in 2020 is to look at that crack, drop our shoulder, run hard at it and build the America we want to be.”

Mr. Sanders, another leading progressive in the race, also waded into the debate over how to defeat Mr. Trump as he uncorked some of his fiercest criticism of Mr. Biden to date in an interview with The Washington Post.

“It’s just a lot of baggage that Joe takes into a campaign, which isn’t going to create energy and excitement,” Mr. Sanders said. “He brings into this campaign a record which is so weak that it just cannot create the kind of excitement and energy that is going to be needed to defeat Donald Trump.”

Mr. Sanders on Thursday reported an eye-popping fund-raising haul of more than $34.5 million in the fourth quarter of 2019, according to his campaign, ahead of Mr. Biden at $22.7 million — Mr. Biden’s strongest quarter to date — as well as former Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Ind., whose campaign reported more than $24.7 million.

Even as Mr. Sanders sharpened his attacks on Mr. Biden in the interview, he largely stuck to his familiar message on the trail in Iowa on Thursday, denouncing income inequality and championing his signature policy proposal, “Medicare for all.” At a canvass kickoff in Grinnell, he jokingly named a young girl as his running mate.

As he boarded his new campaign bus after that event, he briefly answered a question about his fourth-quarter fund-raising, calling attention specifically to the more than five million contributions his campaign had received since he entered the race. “That tells me the kind of grass-roots support that we have and tells me why we’re going to win the nomination and why we’re going to defeat Donald Trump,” he said.

Patrick Healy and Matt Stevens contributed reporting from Concord, N.H.; Sydney Ember from Muscatine, Iowa; and Nick Corasaniti from New York.