Fox Business and the Wall Street Journal, hosts of the next debate, restricted the prime-time stage to candidates with at least 2.5 percent support in an average of the four most recent national surveys conducted through November 4.
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As a result, Christie and Huckabee will join Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and former Pennsylvania Sen.
The New Jersey governor was bumped from next week’s main GOP presidential debate, along with Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, after failing to muster enough support in national polls to qualify.
But the big news is that low polling numbers for George Pataki and Lindsey Graham will exclude them from either debate, effectively making their candidacies moot. The participants in the undercard debates have been given three months, and majority given three opportunities for free air time, and if they can’t even register one percent in the polls at this point, then it hardly makes sense to pay their campaigns serious attention.
Christie averaged just 2% in the most recent Fox News poll, bringing his average down to 2.25% and below Fox’s threshold.
The Graham campaign sent out a statement saying it was disappointed with the decision, and calling the South Carolina senator the “foremost expert on foreign policy and national security” in the Republican field. Ted Cruz of Texas, U.S. Sen.
Those who didn’t make the cut for either are Sen. Rick Santorum in the undercard debate late that afternoon. The line-up for the 9 p.m. main event, in order of ranking, will be front-runner Donald Trump, Dr. Ben Carson, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Florida, ex-Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Ohio Gov. John Kasich.
Candidates’ standing in various nation polls determined whether they were included in the main debate, the undercard, or not included at all.
The previous Republican prime-time debates had at least 10 contenders on stage.
Christie is staking everything on the New Hampshire primary in February, taking inspiration from 2008 when the Granite State revived the political fortunes of Sen.
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Ferry noted that one of the polls used to determine the debate participates – the NBC/ Wall Street Journal poll – only listed ten candidates as options rather than the full GOP field.
