Political reporters and journalists blasted the moderators of CNN’s second-tier Republican debate on Wednesday for kicking off the event with several questions about Donald Trump, who wasn’t even on stage.
At the start of the debate, which featured the four candidates who didn’t make CNN’s primetime debate due to low poll numbers, the moderators asked four questions that dealt with Trump.
The questions went to Bobby Jindal (on whether he was hurting the GOP by attacking Trump); Rick Santorum (on if Jindal was right to attack Trump); Lindsey Graham (on why Trump is ahead of Graham in Graham’s home state of South Carolina); and George Pataki (on if he would support Trump, should Trump win the party’s nomination).
“These questions are making the Fox News debate questions look brilliant,” said veteran political analyst Stuart Rothenberg on Twitter, referring to the first GOP debate hosted by Fox in August.
The Washington Post’s Dave Weigel also mocked the questioning. “‘You said on Twitter that you would not support Donald Trump,’ said the moderator to a candidate for leader of the free world,” he sniped.
“But when will they bring up Trump in this debate?” said a sarcastic tweet by James Pindell of the Boston Globe.
Guy Benson of Fox News and the conservative magazine Townhall noted on Twitter that it wasn’t until the sixth question that a candidate was asked a policy question.
Eventually, the moderators did move on to other areas, including Middle Eastern affairs, immigration and national security.
