Rand Paul fails to qualify for Republican debate with presidential candidates

Rand Paul, once dubbed the most interesting man in American politics, won’t be on the stage for Thursday’s Republican presidential debate.

The Kentucky senator failed to qualify for the main stage when Fox Business News announced its criteria on Monday night and is boycotting the so-called “undercard debate”.

To make the main stage, candidates were required to be among the top five in the polls in the early primary states of Iowa and New Hampshire or in the top six nationally. Paul finished just short. The Kentucky senator polled in seventh place nationally and in sixth place in Iowa.In a defiant statement announcing his boycott, the Paul campaign said: “By any reasonable criteria, Senator Paul has a top-tier campaign. He will not let the media decide the tiers of this race and will instead take his message directly to the voters of New Hampshire and Iowa.”

The statement went on to note that polls are imperfect: “Polls are at best an estimation, and include a standard of error that the media and the RNC are ignoring.” Paul’s office argued that creating tiers based on electoral results of real votes might make sense, but creating tiers on “bad science” was irresponsible.

The Kentucky senator’s campaign insisted that he would triumph in the GOP primary. “This race is hitting its final stretch and Rand Paul is in it to win it. He is on the ballot in every state. He has over 1,000 precinct captains in Iowa and a huge 500-person leadership team in New Hampshire,” the campaign bragged, pledging to campaign in Iowa and New Hampshire instead of appearing on the debate stage.