2016 Debate Watch: Bush Leads Field, Trump Right Behind Him

Matt Vespa | July 16, 2015 2:45 PM

It’s a new week, which means another Fox News debate watch update, folks. Donald Trump is surely enjoying his time in the limelight, though the vast majority of voters don’t think he’s a serious candidate. He also mentioned that the FEC documents, which are required to be filled out in order to run for president, are not designed for a person of his wealth. Nevertheless, here is the polling update on the top ten candidates. The numbers are based on the averages of the five most recent national polls, which can be found here, here, here, here, and here.

Bush: 17
Trump: 10.8
Walker: 9.4
Rubio: 7.8
Carson: 7.6
Huckabee: 6.8
Paul: 6.6
Cruz: 5.2
Christie: 2.8
Perry: 2.8

Yet, the rules for the August 6 debate have been criticized by Sen. Ted Cruz’s (R-TX) campaign for being "unclear" (via Politico):

Ted Cruz’s campaign is leading a charge to pressure Fox News into raising its standards for the national polls that will decide who gets into the first Republican presidential debate.

In a memo sent to fellow GOP campaigns on Wednesday, Chris Wilson, who serves as director of research and analytics for the Cruz campaign, called Fox News’ standards for deciding which national polls are used in its debate entry process “unclear.” Wilson asks the other campaigns to “consider joining with us” in encouraging the network to impose additional polling standards. As it stands, Fox News is allowing the Top 10 contenders, based on an average of the five most recent national polls, into the Aug. 6 debate.

“I’m sure you are aware, the standards set by Fox News for the first GOP Presidential debate are unclear and, it would appear, undefined,” Wilson writes in the memo.

Among the Cruz campaign’s suggestions: That polls included in the national average must have at least 1,000 interviews with primary voters and must be done by telephone (not online). However, no telephone poll conducted this year has surveyed that many GOP primary voters.