1st DEM Debate Thread: June 26 & 27, Miami, MSNBC & NBC & Telemundo (9-11pm)

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I (along with all other decent human beings) will be boycotting this debate if any sitting governor or member of Congress is excluded.

Some of the second tier candidates should really start making this point.

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I hope they never do debates like this again. A debate that takes place in two different sessions is actually useless, the threshold should have been higher.

It's too far out to have anything that is too restrictive. I think the current plan works for the Summer, before then upping the standards in the Fall.

It is not a good setup if the major candidates physically can not all debate each other because it is oh so important that we include the 20 nobodies polling at 1%. It was supposed to be more fair, but it isn't very helpful to the voters if the real contenders can't directly debate.

The voters should decide who the "real contenders" are, not the DNC. It is an abomination that Moulton, Bullock, and Messam have been excluded. This debate is the first opportunity for voters to get to know who the candidates are and decide who the "real contenders" should be, and 3 (4 if you want to count Gravel) have been denied that chance.

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It's not the DNC's fault Bullock didn't qualify. He took until the last minute to announce, and his appeal is already taken by Biden, O'Rourke, etc.

I'm fine with that argument for a later debate, but all candidates with a real campaign (IE, not the people who are just unknown names on the ballot for the lulz) should get a chance to make their appeal to the people on the national debate stage.

A three-night debate with 8 slots each could have sufficed, and the next debate could have had a stricter standard.

[7,052,770]

It's not the DNC's fault Bullock didn't qualify. He took until the last minute to announce, and his appeal is already taken by Biden, O'Rourke, etc.

I'm fine with that argument for a later debate, but all candidates with a real campaign (IE, not the people who are just unknown names on the ballot for the lulz) should get a chance to make their appeal to the people on the national debate stage.

A three-night debate with 8 slots each could have sufficed, and the next debate could have had a stricter standard.

The whole reason we have so many randos running is because they thought they could be one of the 20 who made the debate stage. If they had set the initial cap at 24 candidates we'd have 29 running

If we had 29 candidates, the voters would deserve the chance to see all 29 of them up on the stage making their case.