It was the most intriguing moment of the debate, but if you looked closer, you might have been intrigued even further.
On Mr Steyer's left hand was a symbol, crudely drawn in pen: one large cross with four smaller crosses in each quadrant.
It was not the first time the billionaire hedge-fund manager has been seen with it in public - he's drawn it every day for at least two years - but this debate introduced the symbol to a new audience once again.
A symbol with five crosses like this is known as a Jerusalem Cross, and it was employed as the symbol of the Kingdom of Jerusalem from the 13th Century. The kingdom was established by crusading European Christians who invaded and conquered Muslim lands.
There is not one agreed meaning to the five crosses - various theories suggest they could represent Christ and the four gospels, five wounds suffered by Christ on the cross, or the four points of the compass.
Image copyrightGETTY IMAGESImage captionThe Jerusalem Cross seen at the entrance to a Franciscan convent in Jerusalem
The original symbol is likely to pre-date even the Kingdom of Jerusalem and was used in feudal states in what is now the country of Georgia, which since 2004 has used the five crosses on its national flag.
"It means to tell the truth no matter what the cost is," he said. "For a while now, I have drawn it on my hand every day to remind myself to always tell the truth. I later discovered that it has traditionally been known as a Jerusalem cross."
Image captionTom Steyer in a BBC interview in June 2019 - with the mark on his hand
Mr Steyer - a long-term Democratic donor - is Christian, and this month told a podcast that he was 30 when he found God. But he has not drawn a link between his faith and the symbol on his hand.
Instead, his drive to "tell the truth" is tied to a political group he launched in October 2017, named Need to Impeach, that focused on removing President Donald Trump from office.
It's a message the 62-year-old has repeated since entering the race for the presidency last July. He has also condemned corporate interests that affect government policy, and vowed to declare a state of climate emergency on day one of his presidency, were he to be elected.
Who else uses it?
In recent years, images and terms associated with the Crusades in the Middle East have been appropriated by white supremacists.
When a white supremacist shot dead 50 people in mosques in Christchurch in New Zealand in March last year, his so-called manifesto was reported to include references to the Crusades.
Image copyrightNURPHOTO VIA GETTYImage captionWhite supremacists marched in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017, where an altered Jerusalem Cross was seen (far right)
Banners depicting the Jerusalem Cross, along with the term "Deus vult" (God wills it) that was associated with the Crusaders, were deployed by the far-right during a violent rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017.
As yet, however, the Jerusalem Cross has not been listed as a hate symbol by the influential Anti-Defamation League.
Last week, the US president's son, Donald Trump Jr, defended posting a photo of himself holding a rifle (known as a "Crusader") that featured a Jerusalem Cross - as well as an image of Hillary Clinton in jail.
The photo - posted days after the US assassinated Iranian general Qasem Soleimani - was consistent with a tradition among gun owners of "depicting various historical warriors", Mr Trump Jr's spokesman told the Washington Post. The company that produced the rifle said it was "objectively silly" to suggest the cross was a hate symbol.
"As with all symbols, context is everything," said Dan Jones, a historian and author of Crusaders: The Epic History of the Wars for the Holy Lands.
Jones himself has a tattoo of the Jerusalem Cross on his wrist. He received it a few years ago in Jerusalem, copying a technique used by pilgrims hundreds of years ago.
Image copyrightDAN JONESImage captionHistorian Dan Jones has a tattoo of the Jerusalem Cross
"In the context of a Christian pilgrimage to Jerusalem, this would have been a symbol of peaceful worship," Jones said.
"But in the context of Donald Trump Jr with a Jerusalem Cross on the side of an AR-15 rifle, the context is very clearly one of violence - anti-Muslim violence - and of a civilisational clash going back to the Middle Ages."
The fact the cross has different meanings, like the swastika before it, means any presidential candidate should be more cautious about using it, Jones said, as appropriation of such symbols could play into the hands of those who consider the US to be aggressors.
"[Tom Steyer] clearly has his own reasons for scribbling it on his hand," Jones said. "But he has to be aware of the other context. Were he to be elected president, then Isis [Islamic State group]propaganda would be calling him the Crusader-in-chief."
Such a development is unlikely, however. As the Democrats enter primary season, the polls put Mr Steyer far down the list of favourites for the Democratic nomination.
The original symbol is likely to pre-date even the Kingdom of Jerusalem and was used in feudal states in what is now the country of Georgia, which since 2004 has used the five crosses on its national flag.
"It means to tell the truth no matter what the cost is," he said. "For a while now, I have drawn it on my hand every day to remind myself to always tell the truth. I later discovered that it has traditionally been known as a Jerusalem cross.
Keep these in mind as you contemplate the direction of the American government over the past 50 years and especially since the Obama election.
The Goals of Communism
(as read into the congressional record January 10, 1963, from "The Naked Communist" by Cleon Skousen)
1. U.S. acceptance of coexistence as the only alternative to atomic war.
2. U.S. willingness to capitulate in preference to engaging in atomic war.
3. Develop the illusion that total disarmament of the United States would be a demonstration of moral strength.
4. Permit free trade between all nations regardless of Communist affiliation and regardless of whether or not items could be used for war.
5. Extension of long-term loans to Russia and Soviet satellites.
6. Provide American aid to all nations regardless of Communist domination.
7. Grant recognition of Red China. Admission of Red China to the U.N.
8. Set up East and West Germany as separate states in spite of Khrushchev's promise in 1955 to settle the German question by free elections under supervision of the U.N.
9. Prolong the conferences to ban atomic tests because the United States has agreed to suspend tests as long as negotiations are in progress.
10. Allow all Soviet satellites individual representation in the U.N.
11. Promote the U.N. as the only hope for mankind. If its charter is rewritten, demand that it be set up as a one-world government with its own independent armed forces. (Some Communist leaders believe the world can be taken over as easily by the U.N. as by Moscow. Sometimes these two centers compete with each other as they are now doing in the Congo.)
12. Resist any attempt to outlaw the Communist Party.
13. Do away with all loyalty oaths.
14. Continue giving Russia access to the U.S. Patent Office.
15. Capture one or both of the political parties in the United States.
16. Use technical decisions of the courts to weaken basic American institutions by claiming their activities violate civil rights.
17. Get control of the schools. Use them as transmission belts for socialism and current Communist propaganda. Soften the curriculum. Get control of teachers' associations. Put the party line in textbooks.
18. Gain control of all student newspapers.
19. Use student riots to foment public protests against programs or organizations which are under Communist attack.
20. Infiltrate the press. Get control of book-review assignments, editorial writing, policymaking positions.
21. Gain control of key positions in radio, TV, and motion pictures.
22. Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all forms of artistic expression. An American Communist cell was told to "eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings, substitute shapeless, awkward and meaningless forms."
23. Control art critics and directors of art museums. "Our plan is to promote ugliness, repulsive, meaningless art."
24. Eliminate all laws governing obscenity by calling them "censorship" and a violation of free speech and free press.
25. Break down cultural standards of morality by promoting pornography and obscenity in books, magazines, motion pictures, radio, and TV.
26. Present homosexuality, degeneracy and promiscuity as "normal, natural, healthy."
27. Infiltrate the churches and replace revealed religion with "social" religion. Discredit the Bible and emphasize the need for intellectual maturity which does not need a "religious crutch."
28. Eliminate prayer or any phase of religious expression in the schools on the ground that it violates the principle of "separation of church and state."
29. Discredit the American Constitution by calling it inadequate, old-fashioned, out of step with modern needs, a hindrance to cooperation between nations on a worldwide basis.
30. Discredit the American Founding Fathers. Present them as selfish aristocrats who had no concern for the "common man."
31. Belittle all forms of American culture and discourage the teaching of American history on the ground that it was only a minor part of the "big picture." Give more emphasis to Russian history since the Communists took over.
32. Support any socialist movement to give centralized control over any part of the culture--education, social agencies, welfare programs, mental health clinics, etc.
33. Eliminate all laws or procedures which interfere with the operation of the Communist apparatus.
34. Eliminate the House Committee on Un-American Activities.
35. Discredit and eventually dismantle the FBI.
36. Infiltrate and gain control of more unions.
37. Infiltrate and gain control of big business.
38. Transfer some of the powers of arrest from the police to social agencies. Treat all behavioral problems as psychiatric disorders which no one but psychiatrists can understand.
39. Dominate the psychiatric profession and use mental health laws as a means of gaining coercive control over those who oppose Communist goals.
40. Discredit the family as an institution. Encourage promiscuity and easy divorce.
41. Emphasize the need to raise children away from the negative influence of parents. Attribute prejudices, mental blocks and retarding of children to suppressive influence of parents.
42. Create the impression that violence and insurrection are legitimate aspects of the American tradition; that students and special-interest groups should rise up and use united force to solve economic, political or social problems.
43. Overthrow all colonial governments before native populations are ready for self-government.
44. Internationalize the Panama Canal.
45. Repeal the Connally reservation so the United States cannot prevent the World Court from seizing jurisdiction over nations and individuals alike.
AFP/GETTY IMAGES
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