Over the past few weeks, one topic that has arisen in the election is third party candidates—anybody but the Democratic nominee or Republican nominee—and their lack of participation in the debates. No third party candidate has been invited to participate in either or the two presidential debates thus far, nor was a third party vice presidential candidate present at the Vice Presidential Debate held at Longwood.
The presidential and vice presidential debates are facilitated by the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD), which has been responsible for them since the presidential debates of 1988. The CPD is responsible for selecting the candidates who will appear during the debates.
According to their website, there are three criteria for a candidate to be allowed to debate on their stage.
First, the candidate must be constitutionally eligible to be president, meaning that the candidate must be at least 35 years old, a natural born citizen of the U.S. and a resident of the United States for at least 14 years. Second, the candidate must appear on the ballot in enough states that they could, in theory, get enough electoral votes to become president. Third, when the five selected polls are averaged together, the candidate must have an average of 15 percent of the vote.
The CPD maintains these criteria in order to have an objective threshold for invitations to debate. No party’s nominee is automatically invited to participate (even the Republicans and Democrats don’t have a guarantee of invitation), and no party is automatically excluded. In practice, these criteria has almost always meant that there is the Republican nominee, the Democratic nominee, but no third party candidates. The only exception dates back to 1992 when Ross Perot was invited to debate with George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton.
In the 2016 debate season, there has been civil unrest regarding these rules, particularly in the form of petitions and protests. Out of the myriad of third-party candidates, Libertarian Gary Johnson and Green Party candidate Jill Stein have been serious contenders. Both are constitutionally eligible, Stein is on the ballot in 45 states and Johnson is on the ticket in all 50, but neither have met the 15 percent requirement the CPD has set.
According to the New York Times, the highest that Johnson has nationally polled at is twelve percent. Stein, according to a report by the Pew Research Center, had a maximum of nine percent of national polls.
Most of the protests and petitions have been in regard to allow Johnson to participate in the debates. Johnson’s supporters have started petitions and online campaigns using the hashtag “#letgarydebate” The primary justification that Johnson’s supporters have used is that though only an average nine percent of voters have expressed support for Johnson, a USA today poll found that of voters want Johnson to be invited to the debates.
Longwood has seen two protests to allow Johnson and his vice presidential candidate, William “Bill” Weld, to be able to debate, on Sept. 22 and on Oct. 3.
The CPD responded that for the last debate, held on Oct. 19, that their criteria will be upheld, in particular with the 15 percent standard to be invited.
