The Democratic Primary Debates: A Close Examination of the Data

In this post I am going to examine the data from this election season's Democratic presidential primary debates.

There are 21 Democratic Debates listed on the wikipedia Democratic Primary Debates page - surely there may be more, minor forums, especially ones where only one candidate was highlighted, but these have been excluded. The most important data here is for the debates on major networks because these have the greatest visibility and, thus, audiences. Out of all of these debates, 6 were sanctioned by the DNC - one of which was canceled due to the WGA strike. The sanctioned debates are marked with "DNC Sanctioned".

I added ratings information where available (apparently you have to be a "qualified journalist" in order to access the full Nielsen Ratings). I also noted which candidates were invited, which attended, and if there were any exclusions, on what basis and the candidate's response to his exclusion.

Let's take a look at each of these. Debates on major networks are in red:

April 26, 2007 - Orangeburg, South Carolina - MSNBC
Candidates:
Sen. Christopher J. Dodd, D-Conn.
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y.
Former Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C.
Gov. Bill Richardson, D-N.M.
Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr., D-Del.
Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich, D-Ohio
Former Sen. Mike Gravel, D-Alaska
Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill.

June 3, 2007 - Manchester, New Hampshire - CNN
Ratings: 2.8 million
Candidates:
All

June 28, 2007 - Washington, D.C. - PBS
Candidates:
All

July 12, 2007 - Detroit, Michigan - NAACP webcast
Candidates:
All

July 23, 2007 - Charleston, South Carolina - CNN/You-Tube Debate - DNC Sanctioned
Ratings: 2.6 million
Candidates:
All

August 4, 2007 - Chicago, Illinois - YearlyKos webcast
Candidates:
All except Biden, who was at Congress for a vote

August 7, 2007 - Chicago, Illinois - MSNBC
Candidates:
All but Gravel, who failed to submit a written questionaire by the deadline.

August 9, 2007 - Los Angeles, California - Logo (LGBT) Network
Candidates:
All except Biden and Dodd, who had scheduling conflicts. Gravel was not invited originally because he didn't meet a fundraising threshold, but because of ardent protest from his supporters, he was finally invited.

August 19, 2007 - Des Moines, Iowa - ABC - DNC Sanctioned
Candidates:
All

September 9, 2007 - Coral Gables, Florida - Univision (Spanish Network)
Candidates:
All but Biden

September 12, 2007 - Yahoo! and Huffington Press "mash-up" posted online
Candidates:
All

September 20, 2007 - Davenport, Iowa - PBS, AARP
Candidates:
All but Obama, Kucinich and Gravel. Obama declined his invitation, citing that he was limiting debate appearances organized by special interest groups. Kucinich and Gravel, on the other hand, were excluded because they did not meet AARP's criteria: a campaign office in Iowa and one paid campaign representative. Kucinich cited special interest bias on the part of AARP.

September 26, 2007 - Hanover, New Hampshire - MSNBC - Official
Candidates:
All

October 30, 2007 - Philadelphia, Pennsylvania - MSNBC - DNC Sanctioned
Candidates:
All but Gravel, who failed to meet the requirements set for invitation: 14 visits to New Hampshire and/or Iowa in the last year, polling at 5%, or $1 million raised. Gravel ardently argued against his exclusion. Political director for NBC, Chuck Todd, called Gravel's claims "ludicrous." Gravel staged a counter-debate across the street from the NBC venue. When Kucinich was excluded from the MSNBC debate on Jan 15 and complained that the three other candidates didn't mention his exclusion, Gravel called him out for not mentioning his exclusion from this venue.

November 15, 2007 - Las Vegas, Nevada - Nevada Dem Party/CNN - DNC Sanctioned
Ratings: 4.5 million
Candidates:
All but Gravel, who was again excluded. Controversy flew when it was suggested that the "ordinary voters" who gave questions were planted and their questions censored. This is a given, I thought?

December 4, 2007 - Des Moines, Iowa - NPR "radio only"
Candidates:
All but Richardson, who was attending a funeral for a Korean War casualty.

December 10, 2007 - Los Angeles, California - CBS - DNC Sanctioned - CANCELED
Canceled because candidates refused to cross picket line.

December 13, 2007 - Johnston, Iowa - De Moines Register/Iowa Public TV
Aired on: Iowa Public Television, CNN, MSNBC, Fox News Channel, C-SPAN 3
Candidates:
All but Kucinich and Gravel, both excluded because they did not have a campaign office in Iowa, and Gravel did not have a full-time staff member in-state. Kucinich fumed at the exclusion. At this point, journalists took this opportunity to bring up the fact that Kucinich often refuses to debate candidates for his congressional seat.

- Jan 3 - Biden and Dodd drop out of race due to poor showings in Iowa.

January 5, 2008 - Manchester, New Hampshire - ABC/Facebook
Ratings: 9.36 million; 1.4 million when re-run on CNN
Candidates:
Top four showing in Iowa: Clinton, Obama, Edwards, Richardson. Kucinich, again, issued angry remarks.

- Jan 9 - Richardson drops out of race due to a poor showing in New Hampshire. From here on out, the "Big Three" will refer to Clinton, Obama and Edwards.

January 15, 2008 - Las Vegas, Nevada - MSNBC
Candidates:
"Big Three". Kucinich and Gravel excluded. The current controversy.

January 21, 2008 - Myrtle Beach, South Carolina - CNN
Ratings: 4.91 million
Candidates:
"Big Three". Kucinich and Gravel excluded.

- Jan 24 - Kucinich drops out of the race.

- Jan 30 - Edwards drops out of the race.

January 31, 2008 - Hollywood, California - CNN
Candidates:
Obama and Clinton. Man, no one saw THAT coming.

From this data we can see that the first exclusion of a candidate occurred on August 9, 2007 - five months before the first primary ballot would be cast. Regular exclusions began on September 20 - this was the beginning of Gravel's perpetual exclusion. On December 13, Kucinich began his perpetual exclusion - two weeks before the first primary.

Most of these exclusions were made on a financial basis - either not having a campaign office in-state, a full-time staffer, a fundraising floor or a combination of these.

Now, this is considered weeding out the inviable candidates. Sure, Gravel was polling poorly, but Kucinich was polling well in certain straw polls and less scientific audience polls. And even if these candidates weren't "polling well", haven't we seen from New Hampshire that polls can be wildly off? Not to mention the positive feedback loop that polls create with the voting audience looking for the "most viable candidate".

It's also fairly obvious that even when all of the candidates were invited to a debate, the "Big Three" were given the most air time, and out of those three, Clinton and Obama have been considered the front runners and Edwards the solid third-place candidate. Even the candidates joked about it on-stage! The candidates who remain have been selected from the start.

But why these candidates? Why Clinton and Obama?

A future post will attempt to tackle this question.