Three months ago the Republican Party’s leader pledged to get out of the presidential debates unless changes were made.
This week, the party went one step closer to that.
The GOP leadership voted unanimously Thursday to withdraw from the Commission on Presidential Debates, or CPD, the alleged nonpartisan group that sponsors and hosts the presidential debates. It took on that role with the 1988 election.
“Debates are an important part of the democratic process, and the RNC is committed to free and fair debates. The Commission on Presidential Debates is biased and has refused to enact simple and commonsense reforms to help ensure fair debates including hosting debates before voting begins and selecting moderators who have never worked for candidates on the debate stage,” Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel said in a statement on Thursday.
“The RNC voted to withdraw from the biased CPD, and we are going to find newer, better debate platforms to ensure that future nominees are not forced to go through the biased CPD in order to make their case to the American people,” she added.
“To be clear, we are not walking away from debates. We are walking away from the CPD.”
It’s unclear what that means for the party’s 2024 nominee, or what format the GOP would agree to participate in.
But as The Free Press reported in January the party was unhappy at the CPD’s unwillingness to address legitimate concerns.
The trigger came during the 2020 election when the CPD picked C-SPAN host Steve Scully to moderate the second debate between then-President Donald Trump and Joe Biden. It was later revealed that Scully had once worked for Biden.
In her letter to the CPD in January, McDaniel outlined the package of reforms the GOP wanted to see:
- Adopt term limits for its board
- Schedule at least one debate before early voting begins
- Enact a rule prohibiting board members from making public comments for or against a candidate, or engaging in any partisan activity
- Establish “transparent” criteria for picking moderators, including disqualifying those with “apparent” conflicts of interest
- And implement a code for moderators that spells out guidelines for “appropriate” interactions with the candidates, and imposes “meaningful” penalties for violations
Even as she sent that letter McDaniel seemed resigned to the fact that the CPD would blow it off.
She noted that the party began complaining in March 2021 and nothing was done to heed its concerns.
“Unfortunately, neither the tone nor the substance of your latest response inspires confidence that the CPD will meaningfully address the serious issues which the RNC has raised,” McDaniel wrote at the time.
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About time. The debates are set up the questioners as well as the gotcha questions aimed at any Republican candidate.