CNBC Sets Eligibility Criteria for Next Republican Debate

October 1, 2015

The third Republican presidential debate is scheduled for Wednesday, October 28, in Boulder, Colorado. It will be hosted by CNBC. Befitting that network, the debate will focus on the economy. This includes "jobs, taxes, the deficit and the health of our national economy", according to the original CNBC debate press release. 

The Republican field remains crowded, with 15 candidates vying for the nomination. As a result, there will again be two debates. Qualifications are as follows:

Main Debate (8PM ET): For those candidates averaging 2.5% or higher in qualifying polls released from September 17 to October 21. Qualifying polls are those released by NBC, ABC, CBS, FOX, CNN and Bloomberg. At this point it appears 9 or 10 will qualify for that.

Earlier Debate (6PM ET): For those candidates not meeting the above criteria but who have earned at least 1% in any single poll from the same organizations in the same time frame.  

Four polls appear to qualify thus far. Meeting the 2.5% threshold in all of them are:  Donald Trump, Ben Carson, Carly Fiorina, Marco Rubio, Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz and Chris Christie.

John Kasich only polled 2% in a September 20 CNN poll, but has seen 4-6% support since, so he looks fairly safe at this point. Mike Huckabee saw 6% in that same CNN poll, but his numbers have declined since. He's still likely to make the cut. Rand Paul is on the bubble, averaging just over 2.5% in the four qualifying polls.

Of the remaining five candidates, Bobby Jindal, Rick Santorum and George Pataki have received 1% support in at least one poll, so have qualified for the early debate. Lindsey Graham has not, despite performing well in the early debate last time. Jim Gilmore has also seen 0% in the four qualifying polls.

The table below shows the 270toWin calculated polling average for each Republican candidate. This includes poll sources that are recognized, but not in the CNBC criteria.