Three Republicans May Not Make the Cut for Next Debate
The field is finally narrowing.
According to polling rules set forth by the FOX Business Network, the next Republican debate in January may reduce the number of candidates on stage by three.
Ben Kamisar reports at The Hill:
Next GOP debate stage could shrink to six candidates
As few as six candidates could make the next GOP presidential debate stage in January, as Fox Business Network’s new criteria could drastically shrink the field less than a month before the Iowa caucuses.
Fox Business Network announced three separate avenues to make the main stage, but those pathways are more restricted than in previous debates. Participants in the main stage debate on Jan. 14 must hit the top six in an average of five recent national polls, or top five in an average of recent polls from Iowa or New Hampshire…
Fox Business Network, as in the past, hasn’t announced which polls it would use. But using current RealClearPolitics averages, Donald Trump, Sen. Ted Cruz (Texas), Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.), Ben Carson, former Gov. Jeb Bush (Fla.), and Gov. Chris Christie (N.J.) currently sit in the national top six…
That would relegate Sen. Rand Paul (Ky.), Carly FIorina, and Gov. John Kasich (Ohio) to the undercard debate weeks before the first votes of 2016 are cast.
If that happens, Rand will refuse to participate in undercard:
.@RandPaul Says He Won’t Participate In Undercard Debate https://t.co/7kYeMRIwLB pic.twitter.com/Cew1MM4Xe6
— BuzzFeed News (@BuzzFeedNews) December 23, 2015
It’s surprising that Jeb Bush will likely make the cut given his poor poll numbers.
Hadas Gold of Politico has more:
Only six GOP candidates likely to make next debate stage
According to polling released as of Tuesday, the undercard debate stage would include Sen. Paul, Gov. Kasich, Fiorina, former Gov. Mike Huckabee, former Sen. Rick Santorum and former Gov. George Pataki.
The networks are still struggling to accommodate the unwieldy GOP field, which has been winnowed to 13 but still represents a sprawling contest. Controversy has swirled around the lineup for multiple debates, with criteria changing twice to get Fiorina bumped up to the main event during the second debate and Paul clinging to the prime-time stage of the most recent GOP debate despite technically not having the right numbers.
The debate will air on the FOX Business Network on Thursday, January 14th.
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Comments
The field should be narrowed down to 4: Trump, Cruz, Carson and Rubio.
They are the only candidates who have a chance now. Let’s get on with this.
Frankly, I think Carson is done. It should be the top 3 and no more damn kiddie table debate.
Rubio’s done. Running on his single “accomplishment” of the Gangrene of Eight is his uundoing. The mood of the country is openly hostile to that now.
The winnowing effect has begun. Four candidates have dropped on their own accord – Walker, Perry, Jindahl, and Graham.
Narrowing the debate to six will cause others to drop out. Rand has said he won’t play at the junior table. That is a graceful way for him to focus on his Senate race. Pataki and Gilmore are not even in the mini-debates.
Carly made the jump to the big table but has not been able to capitalize on that jump. She provides more professionalism to the debates, but at some point it has to be reflected in the polls. After a brief uptick, she has fallen back.
Several candidates are polling poorly trying to go after the same voters. These include Kasich, Bush, and Christie. Yet the debate is followed by some actual elections where the also-rans face actual voters and their decisions will count.
Other combinations of voters are just not polling well. Santorum and Huckabee will not get the same voter reaction as in the past. Huckabee has announced that if he is not in the top three in Iowa, he will drop out.
We have already seen many Carson supports shift to Cruz.
JEB will make the main stage even were his polling numbers fall further. Look to FN, Ailes, to make sure of that. IMHO, even were JEB’s numbers fall down below Kasich’s or Paul’s, JEB would be there.
Fox News has become very transparent in it’s “Act of Love” supporting the Bush Dynasty!
And, I can hardly wait for the Fox moderators list of gotcha questions for Trump and Cruz, and maybe Carson; Rubio will be protected unless JEB’s performance on stage were to become extremely pathetic!
A debate without Kasich is a great debate! It’s about time we narrow this down to four candidates. I agree that the undercard or kids debate needs to go away too. Jeb will drop out before Florida to avoid the humiliation of losing badly there.
Difficult as it may be, it would be better if all candidates were on stage. Fox should not be an effective King-maker.
Unfortunately, FOX would avoid cutting Jeb! from the debate. That much we now for certain. But it would be fun to see Jeb! banished to the undercard.
Over a hundred million dollars for Mr. Bush to get a 3-4% rating……..that is a bet gone colossally wrong!
Kasich needs to be gone, and not just from the debates.
I’m ambivalent about this. On the one hand, it’s not the media’s place to eliminate candidates; that’s the voters’ job.
On the other hand, this has gone on long enough and no matter the media bias, there’s no way that people with 1% or 2% support are going to break out.
Nothing in this race is going to move until the bottom candidates start leaving. The only question is where their supporters will go.
I think they should limit debates to candidates who are in double digits.
We need to be at 3 or 4 candidates at this point. With so many on stage, serious questions on Policy can’t be addressed with so many with 30 second time periods. We need limits on the amount of money anyone running for office. We also need TERM Limits on ALL offices. Trump has upset the GOPe and their plans to put up another loser to lose to Queen Hillary so she and her Marxist Kingdom can protect the “Open Borders,” and the “One World Order,” Scheme, with the Bushes & the World Bankers.