Networks announce debates as RNC loses further control of GOP nominating process

A flurry of non-Republican National Committee-sanctioned debates announced this week by television networks marked the latest example of the national committee losing its grip on the presidential primary process.

Less than 24 hours after Wednesday’s fourth RNC debate, new events were unveiled by both CNN and ABC News to take place ahead of the nominating contests in Iowa and New Hampshire. These debates, though, won’t be in coordination with the RNC.

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The committee made the decision official Friday afternoon to release candidates for the Republican nomination from participating solely in RNC-sanctioned debates.

As recently as Thursday, a source familiar said the debate committee hadn’t decided what to do next regarding future debates. They did acknowledge at the time that the committee was considering releasing candidates from exclusivity, giving them the freedom to participate in non-RNC-sanctioned debates.

(Gerald Herbert/AP)

While the non-RNC affiliated debates being revealed before the decision further undercut its authority, the committee’s struggle to keep candidates in line began far earlier, when former President Donald Trump refused to participate in its debates and retained his majority support among Republicans despite it.

Trump kept his potential participation in the RNC debates under wraps in the months leading up to the first event in August, not revealing his plan to skip it until days before. Instead, he plotted his appearances and events near or during the debates as counterprogramming.

2024 candidate and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy began to show significant insubordination during the third debate in October, specifically calling out Republican Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel for GOP electoral failures and telling her to resign. His campaign even launched a website called FireRonna.com. Nonetheless, he still participated in the fourth RNC debate Wednesday.

In a statement Friday to the Washington Examiner, Ramaswamy said, “This is the same RNC that refused to let Chris Christie and I debate. This is the same RNC that hired NBC to moderate the GOP primary debate. This is the same RNC that has been on a losing spree from 2018, 2020, 2022, and 2023.”

“Ronna McRomney sitting atop the RNC reminds me of a squatter in a rent-controlled apartment. It’s time to evict,” he added.

“If you thought the RNC was bad at raising money or early voting, their mismanagement of the GOP primary debates exposes their incompetence at a whole new level. They went from control freaks over the debates, banning candidates from one-on-one forums, to completely giving up and handing over the process to far-left CNN,” Charlie Kirk, CEO and founder of Turning Point USA, told the Washington Examiner.

“This is why the base hates D.C. Republicans. They talk a big game before inevitably caving and letting the Left call the shots,” he continued.

CNN was the first network Thursday to reveal its two planned debates in January, taking place on Jan. 10 in Iowa and Jan. 21 in New Hampshire. Each event is just days before the states’ nominating contests. According to CNN, the Iowa matchup will take place at Drake University in Des Moines, and the New Hampshire debate will be held at St. Anselm College in Goffstown.

However, St. Anselm College was apparently not clued in on the network’s plan. “We were surprised to be included on a press release by a network about a debate which we had not planned or booked. Such a debate announcement breached the RNC debate rules. We have and will continue to work with the Republican Party on debates,” wrote Neal Levesque, the college’s executive director of the New Hampshire Institute of Politics and Political Library, on Friday on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.

After CNN’s announcement, ABC News also revealed its intention to host a Jan. 18 debate in New Hampshire at St. Anselm College alongside WMUR-TV. In their case, though, St. Anselm College seemed involved in the planning, with Levesque sharing the news on his X account.

These debates were announced before the RNC released its decision, undermining the committee’s perceived control over the process.

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The committee noted that nearly all of the remaining candidates who participated in the Alabama debate had requested it release them from exclusivity.

“We have held four successful debates across the country with the most conservative partners in the history of a Republican primary,” the RNC’s Committee on Presidential Debates said of its decision. “We have no RNC debates scheduled in January and any debates currently scheduled are not affiliated with the RNC. It is now time for Republican primary voters to decide who will be our next President and candidates are free to use any forum or format to communicate to voters as they see fit.”