If you were disappointed to see Wednesday's GOP debate in Alabama come to a close, good news—more faceoffs are heading our way in the new year. On Thursday, CNN announced it would host two Republican debates in the early primary states: one on Jan. 10 at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, and another on Jan. 21 at St. Anselm College in Goffstown, New Hampshire. The New York Times notes that the Jan. 10 debate will take place just five days before the Iowa caucus, while the Jan. 21 debate is happening two days before the New Hampshire primary.
Per Politico, the debates are unsanctioned by the Republican National Committee, which sanctioned the first four debates we've seen. The outlet notes that campaigns have griped about the RNC's rule that it will ban any candidate from future sanctioned debates if they take part in an unsanctioned one, though sources say the RNC is meeting Friday to perhaps chuck that rule. Per a Politico analysis of CNN's criteria, former President Trump, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley currently qualify for the Iowa debate, while only Trump and Haley do so far for the New Hampshire debate, though there's still time for businessman Vivek Ramaswamy and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie to make the cut for both.
The AP reports that a third debate is also in the works on Jan. 18 via ABC News and WMUR, also at St. Anselm College, though there appears to be some confusion about the school serving twice as a debate site. "I have no idea about anything with any other network," Neil Levesque, executive director of the college's New Hampshire Institute of Politics, says of the CNN debate on Jan. 21. Although the new debates may be somewhat of a surprise, one thing that's not surprising: A campaign adviser for Trump, the current frontrunner in the GOP race, tells the Times that the former commander in chief doesn't plan to attend any of them. (More debates stories.)
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