Presidential hopeful Chris Christie says he has met the donor requirement threshold to qualify for the fourth GOP debate, although it remains a matter of debate if he has the six percent poll showing to make the cut.
In making the announcement late Monday afternoon, the Christie campaign said in a memo and on X that after a great campaign month, the former New Jersey governor has “well over 80,000 donors.”
That accomplishes half the battle of qualifying for the fourth debate for Mr. Christie, who is running on the slogan “Because The Truth Matters.”
The Republican National Committee (RNC) requires candidates to have secured at least 80,000 unique donors—a 10,000 increase over the criteria to participate in the Miami debate on Nov. 8.
For the next debate, set to take place on Dec. 6 on the campus of the University of Alabama, candidates also have had to garner at least six percent of the vote in at least one national poll and one state poll.
That requirement is also an increase over the qualification requirements for the last GOP debate, which required candidates to be shown as having at least four percent of the vote in national polls.
The poll had to be conducted on or after Sept. 15.
The Christie campaign also cited results from a national poll conducted by FairVote, but it was on ranked-choice voting, and it remains unclear if it falls under the category of polls accepted by the RNC.
In addition to percentages, the polls include other benchmarks, such as the source of the poll and how many voters were surveyed.
The FairVote survey shows Christie polling between 8.5 and 10 percent as a second-choice candidate to front-runner former President Donald Trump. It represented 801 “likely Republican presidential primary voters” and was conducted between Sept. 28 and 30. The poll meets the RNC minimum requirement of 800 voters represented in qualifying polls.
A late September survey by Saint Anselm College’s New Hampshire Institute of Politics, an epicenter for presidential campaigning in the state, predicted that Mr. Christie, who was at the time slipping drastically in polls, would have a difficult time succeeding in the race.
“Former Governor Chris Christie has succeeded in branding himself as the harshest critic of Trump, but at a cost,” the Institute concluded in releasing its results.
“Although he has picked up the support of 29% of respondents who have an unfavorable impression of Trump, he has virtually no support from respondents who view Trump favorably. His 46-point net negative favorability (25%-71%) will likely put a hard ceiling on his potential growth.”
Mr. Christie has said he will only drop out of the race after the New Hampshire primaries and only if he’s not in the “top four.”
As he works to stay in the running for the fourth GOP debate, Mr. Christie has scheduled another appearance in the key battleground state of New Hampshire, which has vowed to hold the first primary in the nation despite the DNC re-calendaring of its historic rank that made it second to South Carolina.
He is appearing under his Tell It Like It is PAC on Thursday at Shane’s Texas Pit in Hampton.
Mr. Christie also recently picked up more vocalized support from New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, a well-known adversary of Mr. Trump. He also recently denounced co-GOP contender Vivek Ramaswamy, a self-made millionaire in the biotech industry.
In September, Mr. Sununu said that Republicans need to realize the ‘Trump brand doesn’t work” and has bolstered anti-Trump attacks by other candidates which is essentially the core of Mr. Christie’s campaign.
Mr. Christie also had time to pick up another mainstream poll if needed to qualify for the fourth GOP debate. The RNC is giving candidates up to 48 hours before the debate to meet the participation requirement.
If he does, that will put four candidates on stage. They include Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley, and Mr. Ramaswamy. All three have already been qualified by the RNC for the debate. Like the first three debates, Mr. Trump has already announced plans not to participate in the event.
Republican presidential candidates (L-R), former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Vivek Ramaswamy and U.S. Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) walk onstage during the NBC News Republican Presidential Primary Debate at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts of Miami-Dade County in Miami, Fla. on Nov. 8, 2023. Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
U.S. Sen. Tim Scott (R-South Carolina), who participated in the last debate, recently dropped out of the race.
The debate is being hosted by NewsNation, which was rated as on the border of center and left-leaning by Allsides.com
It is being moderated by former Fox News host Megyn Kelly, who now hosts her own show on SiriusXM, NewsNation’s Elizabeth Vargas, and The Washington Free Beacon’s Eliana Johnson, a former White House reporter who wrote scripts for conservative Sean Hannity but also was a CNN contributor.
Ms. Kelly moderated the first Republican presidential primary debate in 2016, and Ms. Vargas is a former co-anchor of ABC World News. NewsNation is where former CNN anchor Chris Cuomo now works.
The lineup will be the first of the four debates, including an across-the-board panel of moderators with a strong, conservative background.
During the last debate, Mr. Ramaswamy, in many of his candid and cantankerous comments, called out the liberal media for hosting Republican candidates, saying “Think about who’s moderating this debate. This should be Tucker Carlson, Joe Rogan, and Elon Musk. We’d have 10 times the viewership, asking questions that GOP primary voters actually care about and bringing more people into our party.”
