The first Republican debate has set off a firestorm. And not everyone is happy about it.
And this GOP candidate blindsided the RNC with a devastating lawsuit.
The GOP debates went off without much fanfare, and it’s pretty much exactly what everyone expected.
Even though Trump wasn’t there, many of the questions were about him, and plenty of the contenders stumbled through their pre-canned speeches.
To put it lightly, nothing has changed after the debate. Donald Trump is the leading candidate, and no one could shine through to supplant him.
There’s still plenty of time before the primaries, but Trump’s competitors need to step it up if they have any hope of winning.
Unfortunately for others, they didn’t even make the debate stage, and now they’re calling foul.
Republican presidential candidate Larry Elder stated Wednesday night that he will sue the Republican National Committee (RNC), claiming that he has completed all of the RNC’s qualifications and that “establishment leaders” are attempting to restrict his voice.
“I said from the beginning that it appeared the rules of the game were rigged,” Elder stated in an emailed press release on Tuesday. “Little did we know just how rigged it is.”
“For some reason, the establishment leaders at the RNC are afraid of having my voice on the Debate stage,” Elder added.
“Just as I had to fight to successfully be on the ballot in the California Recall election, I will fight to be on that Debate stage because I fully met all of the requirements to do so.”
A contender had to have 40,000 individual donations by Monday night, as well as 200 individual donors from at least 20 different states, to advance to the debate stage. According to the campaign, it met both of these requirements.
A contender must also “poll at least 1% in three national polls OR 1% in two national polls and 1% in one early state poll from two separate ‘carve out’ states (Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina) recognized by the RNC” by Monday night.
Elder’s campaign claims he met these conditions, but “[o]nly after receiving our completed qualification package, did the RNC inform us that they were not accepting Rasmussen Polls as qualifying toward the debate.”
The RNC emphasized alleged ties between Rasmussen and former President Donald Trump, but Elder has “no knowledge about whether Donald Trump has ever worked with Rasmussen previously,” according to his campaign.
It went on to say that Vivek Ramaswamy and another contender had problems submitting Rasmussen polls and that if the RNC had addressed this with the field, they would have identified other qualifying surveys.
According to the release, Elder was not even considered as a candidate in some polls that the RNC accepts:
In addition, it became clear during the final few days of qualifying for the Debate that Larry Elder was NOT EVEN LISTED as a candidate option in many of the RNC’s “qualifying” polls. How can a GOP poll be considered a qualifying poll for all candidates if not all candidates are listed in the poll? This factor alone should be disqualifying, and the poorly-designed poll requirement by the RNC should be lifted.
Elder plans to pursue a challenge based on the “overly vague rules surrounding which polls, exactly, qualify a candidate for the Debate.”
Stay tuned to the DC Daily Journal.
