Kennedy Failed to Qualify for CNN Debate, Campaign Will Protest Outside NY

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Independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. did not qualify for the CNN presidential debate.

His campaign is organizing a protest outside CNN’s New York studios at Hudson Yards on Friday. Kennedy will not be there. Kennedy complained that President Biden and former President Trump don’t want him to be on the stage with them and CNN ‘illegally’ agreed to their demand.

It’s probably true that the Biden campaign wanted to exclude Kennedy – they did everything they could to keep him from running against Biden. He made the move to being an independent candidate because of how the DNC was rigging the Democrat primary to protect Biden. Imagine a Kennedy had to leave the Democrat Party to run as an independent. We live in strange times.

This may be the beginning of the end of Kennedy’s presidential campaign.

No third-party candidate has been on a presidential debate stage since 1992 when Ross Perot self-funded his campaign. He debated against the incumbent that year, President George H.W. Bush, and Bill Clinton. Perot was determined to deny Bush a second term.

The debate qualification window closed at 12:00:01 a.m. ET on Thursday. Biden and Trump met the constitutional, ballot qualification, and polling thresholds set by CNN.

The CNN requirements that had to be met to participate in the debate were clearly outlined.

In order to qualify for participation, candidates had to satisfy the requirements outlined in Article II, Section 1 of the US Constitution to serve as president, as well as file a formal statement of candidacy with the Federal Election Commission.

According to parameters set by CNN in May, all participating debaters had to appear on a sufficient number of state ballots to reach the 270 electoral vote threshold to win the presidency and receive at least 15% in four separate national polls of registered or likely voters that meet CNN’s standards for reporting.

Polls that meet those standards are those sponsored by CNN, ABC News, CBS News, Fox News, Marquette University Law School, Monmouth University, NBC News, The New York Times/Siena College, NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist College, Quinnipiac University, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post.

Kennedy failed to meet two criteria. He did not earn at least 15 percent support in four approved national polls. By Thursday’s deadline, he had three polls – one from CNN, one from Quinnipiac University, and one from Marquette University Law School. He only showed 10 percent support in the last approved poll that he could have used to qualify, which was published by Fox News.

The second criterion he failed to meet was to be officially on the ballot in enough states to win 270 Electoral College votes, the number required to win the election. At the deadline, Kennedy had less than a third of that number. He is on the ballot in six states – California, Delaware, Hawaii, Michigan, Oklahoma, and Utah. That only adds up to 89 Electoral College votes. The ballot access requirement was significantly more difficult to meet than the polling requirement.

Kennedy’s ballot access operation filed petitions to get on the ballot in more than a dozen states. Groups that are aligned with Biden have targeted the petitions with legal challenges.

Kennedy’s campaign claimed that many of those state ballot petitions would be approved by the June 20 deadline but that didn’t happen. CNN rules were that “the mere application for ballot access” does not count as being on the ballot in that state.

Kennedy draws votes from both of the leading candidates. The Biden campaign and the Trump campaign are concerned that Kennedy may swing the presidential election one way or the other in battleground states. He is already on the Michigan ballot, for example. Ironically, he is on the Delaware ballot. When Joe and Jill Biden go to vote, they will see his name on the ballot. Heh.

So, Kennedy will not get exposure with the large viewing audience that is predicted for the debate. More than 73 million people watched the first debate between Biden and Trump in 2020. There are two presidential debates scheduled.

Kennedy called the decision “undemocratic, un-American and cowardly.” This is a pretty good description of how Team Biden has conducted itself all along. We’ll see if Kennedy’s campaign can survive to the finish line in November.