It was not only Mr. Sanders and Mr. Bloomberg who were subjected to withering criticism: Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota and former Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Ind., also engaged in a bitter and lengthy colloquy about foreign policy and their qualifications for the presidency, culminating in a sharp exchange in which Ms. Klobuchar asked Mr. Buttigieg if he was calling her dumb.

There was little in the debate to suggest that Mr. Sanders, the national front-runner and the favorite to win Nevadas caucuses on Saturday, had been knocked off balance, and the pile-on against Mr. Bloomberg had the potential to work in Mr. Sanderss favor by keeping the focus of hostilities elsewhere.

But Mr. Sanders, too, was pressed to address some of the persistent questions about his candidacy, including whether he would release a fuller version of his medical records and why his candidacy appears to inspire uniquely vitriolic behavior by some of his supporters on the internet. Mr. Sanders, Vermonts junior senator, insisted that nearly all of his online fans were good and decent people, but said he would disown those people who behave in deplorable ways.

Nobody acted with more urgency than Ms. Warren, who finished a distant fourth in New Hampshire after doing little to stand out in the debate there. She repeatedly inserted herself into main currents of the conversation. The challenge for her, though, is that her newfound vigor came after tens of thousands of Nevadans had already cast their ballots in early voting.

It was Ms. Warren who initiated the exchange that may have damaged Mr. Bloomberg the most when she repeatedly demanded to know whether he would be willing to release some of the former female employees at his news media organization from the nondisclosure agreements they had signed. He declined to do so, calling the agreements consensual, and minimized the underlying complaints by suggesting that the women merely didnt like a joke I told.

After pressing Mr. Bloomberg and leaving him flustered, but unable to coax him into releasing the women she said he had muzzled, Ms. Warren then broadened her attack.

We are not going to beat Donald Trump with a man who has who-knows-how-many nondisclosure agreements and the drip, drip, drip of stories of women saying they have been harassed and discriminated against, she said.

Go here to read the rest:
Warren Leads an Onslaught of Attacks, Zeroing In on Bloomberg - The New York Times