WASHINGTON: The nation will once again hear from 20 Democratic presidential candidates later this month.
The candidates who qualified for the second Democratic debates, which are being held on July 30 and 31 in Detroit and hosted by CNN, were announced Wednesday.
To qualify, candidates had to poll at 1% or more in at least three qualified polls or receive donations from at least 65,000 individual donors, with a minimum of 200 individual donors per state in at least 20 states.
The lineup is relatively unchanged since the debates in June, with only one new candidate making the stage.
Montana Gov. Steve Bullock will take the place previously held by Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., who dropped out of the race earlier this month. Bullock was late to join the race and did not qualify for the June debates. His campaign in turn criticized the DNC over what they called the “arbitrary threshold” for polling.
CNN on Thursday will hold a live drawing at 8 p.m. ET to determine which candidates will appear on which night.
Here are all the candidates, in alphabetical order, who will be in the next debate:
Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colorado
Former Vice President Joe Biden
Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J.
Montana Gov. Steve Bullock
South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg
Former HUD Secretary Julian Castro
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio
Former Rep. John Delaney, D-Md.
Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, D-Hawaii
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y.
Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif.
Former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee
Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn.
Former Rep. Beto O’Rourke, D-Texas
Rep. Tim Ryan, D-Ohio
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.
Activist Marianne Williamson
Entrepreneur Andrew Yang
Who didn’t make it
Five other candidates failed to make the July debates: former Sen. Mike Gravel of Alaska, Miramar, Florida, mayor, Wayne Messam, U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton of Massachusetts, former U.S. Rep. Joe Sestak of Pennsylvania, and billionaire activist Tom Steyer. Four of them failed to meet either the polling or fundraising criteria needed to make the stage; Gravel met the fundraising criteria, but not the polling benchmark.
The debates could be a make-or-break moment for low-polling candidates.
After this month, the threshold candidates need to meet in both polling and fundraising increases.
For debates scheduled for September and October, candidates will have to hit 2% in four qualifying polls and tally at least 130,000 individual donors, according to the DNC guidance. At this point, only 5 candidates — Biden, Buttigieg, Harris, Sanders and Warren — out of 25 would qualify for the September debate, according to an analysis by FiveThirtyEight. Three others have met the fundraising threshold, but not the polling mark.