Republican presidential candidates Larry Elder and Perry Johnson say they plan to file a lawsuit against the Republican National Committee (RNC) after they failed to qualify for last night’s primary debate.
Elder took to X, formerly known as Twitter, the platform formerly known as Twitter, where he accused the qualification process of being “rigged.”
“I said from the beginning that it appeared the rules of the game were rigged, little did we know just how rigged it is,” Elder wrote. “For some reason, the establishment leaders at the RNC are afraid of having my voice on the debate stage.”
Johnson claimed to have met every requirement for the debate, and still, his application was rejected. He asserts that all roads lead back to former President Donald Trump.
“It is clear that from the beginning, the RNC knew who they wanted on the stage and who they wanted to ban from the stage,” Johnson wrote in a public statement. “Simply put, this is a flawed decision of a poorly run process of a corrupt organization. The reason, as stated by the RNC, is that Rasmussen Polls have ties to former President Donald Trump — an individual who is not even participating in the upcoming debate.”
Unlike Johnson, Elder had not met every requirement — admitting he was 2,000 donors short of the minimum 40,000 donor threshold needed to qualify for the debate.
RNC issued a statement addressing the allegations.
“The RNC worked over two years to deliver a transparent and fair primary process that will put our eventual nominee in the best position to beat Biden,” RNC spokesperson Keith Schipper said. “Criteria to qualify for the first debate was clearly presented to campaigns and RNC leadership and members of the debate committee were in constant communication with candidates and campaigns throughout the qualifying period.”
