Las Vegas, October 14 (RHC)-- Five U.S. Democratic presidential hopefuls faced off Tuesday night in the first of six debates in the 2016 campaign.

The participants were former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, former Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley, former Virginia Senator Jim Webb and former Rhode Island Governor Lincoln Chafee.

The candidates for the Democratic nomination squared off on topics including gun control, economic inequality, regulation of Wall Street and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. In the most heavily tweeted moment of the night, Senator Sanders said the debate should focus on income inequality -- not on Hillary Clinton’s use of a private e-mail server.