US Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren is being hailed as "Hermione Granger throwing fireballs" on social media for her fiery performance during a televised debate on Thursday (NZ time).
Although Senator Warren, 70, has fallen to third place in the race to win the nomination, she was social media's clear favourite in Wednesday's war of words.
Appearing in his first presidential debate at the Paris Theatre in Las Vegas, multibillionaire and former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, 78, struggled to stack up against Warren's scathing attacks on his "decades of mistreatment of women".
The former teacher, who has been vocal about her experiences with gender discrimination, addressed Bloomberg's controversial past peppered with misogynistic comments and 'stop-and-frisk' policing policies that targeted African-Americans and other minorities.
Branding Bloomberg a "billionaire who calls women fat broads and horse-faced lesbians", Warren barbed the businessman over non-disclosure agreements silencing female employees' claims of sexual harassment.
A floundering Bloomberg said "lots and lots of women" have "big responsibilities" and "get paid exactly the same as men" at his company Bloomberg LP.
"I hope you heard what Mayor Bloomberg's defence of decades of mistreatment of women was: 'I've been nice to some women,'" Warren countered.
The hashtag 'WarrenForTheWin' promptly topped Twitter's trending list.
"Elizabeth Warren is Hermione Granger throwing fireballs," tweeted author and law professor Seth Abramson, who has written books alleging Donald Trump is a criminal.
Bloomberg's frequent apologies and lack of spirit also attracted attention, with some viewers questioning whether enough of his hefty campaign budget was allocated to his debate preparation.
Numerous journalists have speculated whether Bloomberg's history of sexist comments will come back to haunt him, including his 1997 claim that he had "a girlfriend in every city" and the charming one-liner, "I'd do her", in regard to female co-workers and employees.
In a 1996 interview with The Guardian, Bloomberg responded to a question about his newly-divorced lifestyle: "I like theatre, dining and chasing women. Let me put it this way: I am a single, straight billionaire in Manhattan. What do you think? It's a wet dream."
