The Democratic National Committee announced Thursday it plans to rely on a “two-path” system to decide which of the presidential contenders get invitations to participate in the first two national televised debates of the 2020 nomination race.
DNC Chair Tom Perez said candidates must either get at least 1 percent in three different approved polls in 2019 or receive contributions from at least 65,000 individuals, including 200 contributors in each of at least 20 states.
“We’ve spent months working with media partners to provide this unprecedented opportunity for candidates and voters to get to know each other,” Mr. Perez said. “Because campaigns are won on the strength of their grassroots, we also updated the threshold, giving all types of candidates the opportunity to reach the debate stage and giving small-dollar donors a bigger voice in the primary than ever before.”
The rules provide both an opportunity and challenge for lesser-known candidates that will have a lot to gain from appearing on the same stage as the party’s front-runners.
Facing the prospect of having upwards of two dozen candidates in the field, the DNC has been looking to strike a balance between giving as many candidates a chance to be heard without having the entire affair turn into a political circus.
They decided that the number of participants will be capped at 20. If more candidates qualify, those with the best polling and fundraising scores will be chosen.
The DNC has been looking to avoid a repeat of the 2016 nomination race when activists believed the party favored Hillary Clinton over Sen. Bernard Sanders and organized the debate schedule to favor her.
They also hoped to sidestep some of the criticism that GOP leaders faced in 2016 when the lesser-known candidates were relegated to a “kiddies’ table” debate before the party’s front-runners faced off in prime time. Under the new rules, the DNC has scheduled debates on back-to-back nights in prime time, and dictated that the lineups for each of the debates will be randomly chosen.
On Thursday, the DNC announced it has partnered with NBC News, MSNBC and Telemundo for the June showdown and CNN for the July debate. The events will be broadcasted in English and Spanish.
Overall, the party has slated a dozen debates — six in 2019 and six in 2020.
• Seth McLaughlin can be reached at smclaughlin@washingtontimes.com.
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