CNN is putting its foot down, and insists it will not be changing the criteria it established for its Republican presidential debate in September, even as GOP candidate Carly Fiorina protests the network.
Last week, Fiorina’s campaign accused CNN of establishing unfair admission standards for its debate in September, standards that might keep her out of the main event, and relegate her to a smaller venue.
CNN has said it would not change its criteria, which were published in May, because it would violate FEC regulations. More recently, however, CNN is simply maintaining that Fiorina should have objected to the standards when they were made public, and that it’s too late to complain now.
“Our criteria are totally appropriate and we have been absolutely transparent about them throughout,” a spokesperson for CNN told The Wall Street Journal on Friday. “If the Fiorina campaign had an issue with them they could have raised it when we published them in May. They did not. Revising the criteria on the eve of the debate at the demand of and solely for the benefit of one particular candidate is not something we have done in the past, and we will not do it now.”
CNN’s current rules dictate that candidates polling in the top 10 of an average of national polls will be featured in one segment of the debate, while another segment will be reserved for seven candidates who fall outside of the top tier.
Candidates who don’t make it on stage with the top 10 candidates are perceived as less likely to win the party’s nomination. Fiorina only recently began polling in the top 10, but CNN’s current method for the debate will lean on the earlier polls, thus possibly excluding Fiorina from the main stage.
Last week, a former chairman of the Federal Election Commission said he believes CNN has the right to alter its debate rules in order to ensure they reflect the current state of the race. Fiorina’s camp has been saying Fox agreed to alter its rules, and that CNN should as well.
CNN’s debate is scheduled for Sep. 16.
