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→‎August 6, 2015 – Cleveland, Ohio: historical footnote, the previous fox-debate-invitation-criteria should be mentioned parenthetically, especially since they were arguably changed (repeatedly) due to outside pressures
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Revision as of 22:42, 3 August 2015

2016 U.S. presidential election
Republican Party
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The 2016 Republican presidential debates will occur among candidates for the Republican Party's presidential nomination for the national election of 2016.

Announced debates

The Republican National Committee announced the 2015–2016 debate schedule on January 16, 2015. It revealed that only 12 debates would be held, in a stark contrast to the 27 debates and forums that were held from 2011 to 2012. The announcement included which news organizations would host each debate, with Fox News and CNN having three each; and one each for ABC, CBS, NBC, CNBC, Fox Business Network, and a conservative media outlet to be announced. The first debate will be Thursday, August 6, 2015, one debate will follow per month until February, when three are scheduled, and March, when two are scheduled.[1]

Logistics

With up to 18 major candidates potentially vying for the nomination, the prospect of including all the candidates in a debate presents logistical difficulties. For the August 6, 2015 Fox News debate, only the top 10 candidates based on the most recent five national polls will be invited to the 9 pm debate. Other candidates have the chance to participate in another debate that will be held at 5 pm.[2] For the September 16, 2015 CNN debate, there will be one debate with only candidates who are in the top ten in recent polling, and another for those not in the top ten but polling at least one percent in "public polling".[3] (However, CNN has reserved the right to, at their discretion, limit primetime participation to the top eight candidates,[4][5] in a situation where fewer than 15 candidates qualify according to CNN's specific criteria.) In mid-July Fox News required that candidates offer a full personal financial disclosure prior to the first debate, which is in line with Federal Election Commission guidelines (but sets an earlier deadline for the disclosure).[6]

The use of polls to winnow the field has been criticized, especially but not exclusively by candidates with relatively low polling numbers at this point – including Rick Santorum and Lindsey Graham – who have complained that exclusion from the debates could prevent them from being competitive in the primaries and caucuses.[7] Candidates ranked from 8th to 12th place in the polls -- including Chris Christie, Rick Perry, and John Kasich -- have downplayed the importance of being invited to any specific debate, emphasizing that delegate-selection in early states is more important.[8] Some[who?] in the media have questioned Donald Trump's seriousness as a candidate and have pondered as to whether or not he should be included in the debates.[9][10][11] Trump filed FEC paperwork to make is run official;[12] however, despite doing relatively well in the early polling which effectively guarantees him an invitation to the FOX and CNN debates, Trump is ambivalent about the value of the debates to his own campaign (saying he is not a debater and therefore does not know how well he will perform in one), and to the process in general (saying that politicians are always debating with little in the way of results).[8] Candidates like Chris Christie and Rand Paul have said that the debates will give candidates a chance to communicate policy-ideas to voters, and will thus be helpful in giving voters the information needed to decide which candidate to support.[8] Outside the presidential campaigns themselves, the use of polling-data has been criticized by polling firms such as Marist, who temporarily suspended their national polling of preferences for the Republican nominee, on grounds that the use of polling-data to select the debate field puts polling firms under pressure to produce high-precision results that are inherently impossible to provide, due to the margin of error in any statistical sampling process like a preference-poll (see statistical tie for tenth place and more generally the independence of clones).[13] FiveThirtyEight has pointed out the varying degrees of discretion that the television networks have given themselves with their distinct debate-invitation-criteria, noting that the polling-data can only be seen as an objective method for selection of the debate participants, if the full and exact criteria are made clear in advance.[5] The rhetoric about the pros and cons of the debate-criteria, and the use of polls to winnow the field, has partially displaced more-substantive discussions of concrete policies that candidates are proposing.[8]

The debates

The following table lists all 12 debates (plus the "forum" broadcast shortly before the officially sanctioned televised debates -- which because candidates will speak one at a time[14] is technically not an RNC-sanctioned "debate" and thus is not considered a violation of RNC prohibitions[15] against any candidate participating in non-sanctioned "debate" events),[16] their locations, their hosts and sponsors, and all candidates who will participate in each debate.[17]

Debates among candidates for the 2016 Republican Party U.S. presidential nomination
N°. Date Place Sponsor Participants*
P Participant, main debate. S Participant, secondary debate.
I Invitee (to a future debate).   N Non-invitee.† A Absent invitee. O Out of race (exploring or suspended). 		Jeb
Bush 		Ben
Carson 		Chris
Christie 		Ted
Cruz 		Carly
Fiorina 		Jim
Gilmore 		Lindsey
Graham 		Mike
Huckabee 		Bobby
Jindal 		John
Kasich 		George
Pataki 		Rand
Paul 		Rick
Perry 		Marco
Rubio 		Rick
Santorum 		Donald
Trump 		Scott
Walker
F1 August 3, 2015 St. Anselm College
Goffstown, NH 		C-SPAN, et al P P P P P N[18][19][20] P A[20] P P P P P P P A[20][21] P
1 August 6, 2015 Quicken Loans Arena
Cleveland, OH 		Fox News/Facebook/Ohio Republican Party
2 September 16, 2015 Reagan Library
Simi Valley, CA 		CNN/Salem Radio/Reagan Library Foundation
3 October 28, 2015 Coors Events Center
Boulder, CO 		CNBC/University of Colorado, Boulder
4 November 2015 Wisconsin Fox Business Network/Wall Street Journal
5 December 15, 2015 Nevada CNN/Salem Radio
6 January 2016 Iowa Fox News
7 February 6, 2016 New Hampshire ABC News/Independent Journal Review
8 February 13, 2016 South Carolina CBS News
9 February 26, 2016 Houston, Texas NBC News/Telemundo/National Review
10 March 2016 TBD Fox News
11 March 2016 Florida CNN/Salem Radio
12 TBD TBD TBD
*^ Participating in at least one debate listed above:
†^ Not invited to any debate listed above:

Summaries

August 3, 2015 – Goffstown, New Hampshire

The Voters First Forum[22] moderator is Jack Heath of WGIR radio, who will ask questions of each of the participating candidates based on a random draw.[20] Candidates will each have three opportunities to speak: two rounds of questions, and a closing statement.[23] Topics of discussion during the forum are partially selected based on the results of online voter-survey.[24] The debate facilities are being provided by the New Hampshire Institute of Politics and Political Library of St. Anselm College (politician-ratings-group Live Free or Die Alliance is an associate sponsor). The forum was organized in response[21][21] to the top-ten (or possibly top-eight) debate-invitation-limitations placed by FOX and CNN on their first televised debates (see descriptions below).

The Voters First forum will be broadcast nationally[25] by C-SPAN[26] as the originating-source media entity, beginning at 6:30pm EDT and lasting[citation needed] from 7pm to 9pm. The event will also be simulcast and/or co-sponsored by television stations KCRG-TV in Iowa, New England Cable News in the northeast, WBIN-TV in New Hampshire,[27] WLTX-TV in South Carolina, radio stations New Hampshire Public Radio, WGIR in New Hampshire, iHeartRadio on the internet (C-SPAN is also offering an online version of the broadcast), and newspapers the Cedar Rapids Gazette in Iowa, the Union Leader in New Hampshire, and the Post and Courier in Charleston South Carolina.[20] There will be a live audience, as well, with tickets to the event awarded via a lottery.[21]

August 6, 2015 – Cleveland, Ohio

The first Republican debate will be hosted by Fox News and Facebook at the Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland, Ohio – the same location as the future 2016 Republican National Convention. The two-hour debate, which will air on Fox News at 9 pm EDT, will invite the 10 highest-polling candidates, as measured by the average of the top five national polls selected by Fox. In addition, all other candidates who are "consistently being offered" as choices in national polls will be invited to a one-hour debate beginning at 5 pm EDT.[2] (Originally, the non-primetime debate had a minimum requirement that invitees were averaging at least 1% in FOX-recognized national polls,[28] and was to be aired at noon for a total of two hours in duration.)

The two-tiered debate hosted by FOX on the 6th is expected to be qualitatively different from the C-SPAN forum held on the 3rd, for at least three reasons: because it is a debate rather than a forum, candidates will be allowed to challenge each other, not just speak one at a time sequentially; because it is divided into two tiers based on national polling numbers, only a subset of the candidates will be on-stage (during each of the two distinct FOX airtimes); and finally, Donald Trump is expected to be a participant in the FOX primetime-tier, whereas Trump declined to participate in the C-SPAN forum entirely (Mike Huckabee is also skipping the C-SPAN forum and is also predicted to appear in the primetime-tier of the first FOX debate).[23]

September 16, 2015 – Simi Valley, California

The second debate will take place at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, which previously hosted two of the Republican debates in 2008 – the very first one and the penultimate one. Similarly to the latter, this debate will air on CNN. Similar to the Fox News-sponsored debate in Cleveland, the debate will be split into a primary and secondary grouping. Rules for dividing the groups have been published by CNN.[29]

October 28, 2015 – Boulder, Colorado

The third debate will be held on October 28 at the University of Colorado in Boulder. CNBC stated it would focus on the economy.[30]

November 2015 – Wisconsin

The fourth debate will be held somewhere in Wisconsin, airing on the Fox Business Network.

December 15, 2015 – Nevada

The fifth debate, and the final debate of 2015, will be held on December 15, 2015, somewhere in Nevada. It will be the second debate to air on CNN, and will also be broadcast by Salem Radio.

January 2016 – Iowa

The sixth debate, and the first debate of 2016, will be held in Iowa, which holds the first caucuses, and will be the second debate to air on Fox News.

February 6, 2016 – New Hampshire

The seventh debate will be held in the first state to hold primaries, New Hampshire, and will air on ABC News.

February 13, 2016 – South Carolina

The eighth debate, and second consecutive debate in the month of February, will be held in another early primary state of South Carolina, airing on CBS News.

February 26, 2016 – Houston, Texas

The ninth debate, and third and final debate of February, will be held in Houston, Texas, and will air on NBC News in conjunction with Telemundo and National Review.

March 2016 – TBA

The first of two known debates to be held in March 2016, and the tenth debate overall, will be the third and final debate to air on Fox News.

March 10, 2016 – TBA

The second of two known debates in March, the eleventh overall, will be the third and final debate to air on CNN, and the second debate to be broadcast by both CNN and Salem Radio.

See also

References

  1. ^ "2016 Presidential Debate Schedule: Republican Party Rolls Out Dates". Politico. Retrieved January 16, 2015.
  2. ^ a b "Fox lowers threshold for early debate". Politico. July 30, 2015. Retrieved August 3, 2015.
  3. ^ "CNN announces details of Republican presidential debate". CNN. May 21, 2015. Retrieved May 22, 2015.
  4. ^ http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2015/images/05/20/debate.criteria1.pdf
  5. ^ a b Harry Enten (June 8, 2015). "What Fox News Still Isn't Saying About Its GOP Debate". FiveThirtyEight. Retrieved August 3, 2015.
  6. ^ Matea Gold (July 9, 2015). "GOP candidates must turn in financial disclosure on time to get into first debate". The Washington Post.
  7. ^ Yaccino, Steven (July 6, 2015). "The Republican Debate Selection Process Is a New Wild Card in Presidential Politics". Bloomberg Politics. Retrieved July 9, 2015.
  8. ^ a b c d Ian Talley; Victoria McGrane (August 2, 2015). "Rules Take Center Stage Ahead of First Debate". Washington Wire. Retrieved August 3, 2015.
  9. ^ Schlesinger, Robert (June 30, 2015). "Seriously Unserious". U.S. News & World Report. Retrieved July 9, 2015.
  10. ^ Lewis, Matt K. (July 7, 2015). "Why Donald Trump Must Be Allowed To Debate". The Daily Caller. Retrieved July 9, 2015.
  11. ^ "Republicans' Donald Trump Debate Mistake". National Journal. June 23, 2015. Retrieved August 3, 2015.
  12. ^ Heather Haddon. "Donald Trump Files Paperwork Making 2016 Run Official". The Wall Street Journal.
  13. ^ "Marist poll suspended due to Fox News debate rules". Washington Examiner. August 2, 2015. Retrieved August 3, 2015.
  14. ^ http://www.nytimes.com/politics/first-draft/2015/07/15/candidate-forum-planned-in-new-hampshire-before-first-republican-debate/
  15. ^ http://www.politico.com/story/2015/01/rnc-2016-debate-schedule-114329.html
  16. ^ http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/aug/2/voters-first-forum-to-test-14-republican-president/?utm_source=RSS_Feed&utm_medium=RSS
  17. ^ "Republican debate calendar (updated)". Politico. Retrieved May 15, 2015.
  18. ^ http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/03/politics/first-republican-presidential-debate-thursday-preview/index.html
  19. ^ http://money.cnn.com/2015/08/03/media/new-hampshire-republican-debate/index.html
  20. ^ a b c d e Paul Feely (August 1, 2015). "Voters First Forum levels the playing field". New Hampshire Union-Leader. Retrieved August 3, 2015.
  21. ^ a b c d "Trump tells Union Leader: No endorsement, no show". Union Leader. July 29, 2015. Trump is still not participating... because he thinks he is unlikely to get the [newspaper which is a forum co-sponsor] New Hampshire Union Leader's endorsement ... because of a Union Leader editorial critical of him [Trump] ... 'and for other reasons including the fact that I feel there are too many people onstage to have a proper forum, [therefore] I will not be attending.'
  22. ^ or in some sources, the "2016 Voters First Presidential Forum"
  23. ^ a b http://money.cnn.com/2015/08/03/media/new-hampshire-republican-debate/index.html
  24. ^ "Voters First Forum Topics". On Monday, August 3, candidates ... will be broadcast live on C-SPAN at 7 p.m. Topics for the forum will be determined by you, the voters. Please choose the top five topics you would like to see discussed. ...from these [five] identical drop-down lists: Iran nuclear deal, Homeland Security (Terrorism), Defense, International Trade, Immigration, Russia, Climate change, Crime, Drugs/heroin, Death penalty, Euthanasia, U.S. debt/deficit, Taxes, Economy and jobs, Campaign spending Reform, Social Security, Medicare, Healthcare/Obamacare, Gay marriage, Religious freedom, Privacy/surveillance, Education/Common Core, Abortion, 1st Amendment, 2nd Amendment, Race.
  25. ^ "Outfoxed: Voters Forum to be first for GOP". New Hampshire Union Leader. July 14, 2015. Retrieved August 3, 2015.
  26. ^ "Radio 2016 Republican Candidates Voters First". C-SPAN.
  27. ^ http://www.unionleader.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20150723/NEWS060501/150729542
  28. ^ http://www.politico.com/story/2015/07/fox-republican-debate-lowers-threshold-120748.html
  29. ^ "Candidate Criteria for September 16, 2015 CNN Ronald Reagan Presidential Library Republican Presidential Primary Debate" (PDF).
  30. ^ "CNBC to Host Republican Presidential Debate at the University of Colorado Boulder on Wednesday, October 28". CNBC. July 16, 2015. Retrieved July 21, 2015.
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