11 to share stage in next GOP TV debate

Associated Press

WASHINGTON

Eleven Republican presidential candidates have qualified for next week’s prime-time debate, a slate that features the full diversity of the GOP’s 2016 class and is believed to be the largest group to share a presidential debate stage in modern political history.

The candidates scheduled to meet for Wednesday’s prime-time affair, announced Thursday night by debate host CNN, will include former technology executive Carly Fiorina, whose weak polling numbers kept her off the main stage of the first debate. But a bump in the polls and an aggressive lobbying effort persuaded CNN to broaden its participation criteria, a coup for Fiorina and GOP officials eager to feature the party’s only 2016 female candidate in the nationally televised clash.

But don’t expect Fiorina to get as much airtime as Donald Trump, who will be positioned front and center when the candidates meet at the Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif.

Sharing the stage with Trump and Fiorina at next week’s 8 p.m. debate will be former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Ohio Gov. John Kasich.