Judge kills Gary Johnson’s attempt to change presidential debate rules

Declaring that the general election presidential debates are “not a public forum,” a federal judge has quashed a lawsuit brought against the political establishment’s Commission on Presidential Debates by Libertarian Gary Johnson and the Green Party’s Jill Stein.

Judge Rosemary Collyer of the U.S. District Court for Washington, D.C. let the case sit for months before ruling this week that Johnson and Stein have no legitimate antitrust of 1^st Amendment challenges to the CPD’s process of deciding who gets to attend presidential debates this fall.

Since 2000, the Republican- and Democratic-controlled CPD has required that candidates average 15 percent in national polls to participate in the presidential debates. Without the massive corporate campaign funding and media focus afforded to the major party candidates leading up to the debates, the threshold is almost always exclusionary to outsiders.

Johnson and Stein sought to challenge the 15 percent rule, arguing that being included as a presidential choice on ballots in enough states to produce a mathematical possibility that a third-party could win should be enough to allow American debate viewers to hear their arguments.

Collyer evidently disagrees.

She ruled:

Plaintiffs in this case have not alleged a non-speculative injury traceable to the Commission….Plaintiffs’ alleged injuries are wholly speculative and are dependent entirely on media coverage decisions. The alleged injuries––failure to receive media coverage and to garner votes, federal matching funds, and campaign contributions—were caused by the lack of popular support of the candidates and their parties sufficient to attract media attention. It is obvious that Defendants did not cause Plaintiffs’ alleged harms[.]

It doesn’t matter, of course, that the CPD’s board is certainly not lacking in folks who may have just a little bit of sway over presidential media coverage, including:

• Billionaire investor Warren Buffet’s (a guy who is known for his massive media investments) son Howard G. Buffett.
• Charles Gibson of Good Morning America and World News Tonight fame.
• PBS NewsHour’s former anchor and the “Dean of Moderators” Jim Lehrer.
• Former FCC chair Newton N. Minow, who built some impressive media ties in the “vast wasteland” over the years.
• Former chairman and CEO of Time Warner Richard Parsons (he’s currently board chairman of the Rockefeller Foundation.

The point is, these debates aren’t organized by average Americans. They’re controlled by a group of people with ties to some of the most powerful political and corporate interests in the country.  Between the CPD’s above-listed and other members are ties to the RAND Corporation, Blue Cross, AARP, Lockheed, Anheuser-Busch, the Ford Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, the Carnegie Foundation, CBS, UPS, Tribune Co., and the list goes on.

And the establishment candidates they allow onstage are their pets. Remember the wild debate rules that surfaced in the last election?

Collyer is right to say that the presidential debates aren’t public forums. It’s rather obvious that they’re marketing platforms owned and operated by the people who stand to gain the most by making sure Americans are only given options beholden to the nation’s elite.

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