The Republican National Committee (RNC) is awarding the Feb. 26 Houston, Texas, debate it has taken away from NBC News to CNN, Breitbart News has learned from RNC sources.
CNN will moderate the debate along with National Review and Telemundo—two outlets that were scheduled to moderate the Feb. 26 Houston debate with NBC News—and with Salem Communications.
Several GOP debates this cycle have been moderated by CNN—and have been successful so far.
The RNC’s Debate Committee voted unanimously on Monday via teleconference, after an update from RNC chairman Reince Priebus, to formally extricate NBC News as the moderator of the Houston debate. The decision came after an abysmal performance in Colorado’s October debate by NBC partner CNBC, particularly by co-moderator John Harwood who was roundly criticized for a poor performance as moderator.
The Houston debate will come after voters in Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, then Nevada make their picks for the GOP nomination in 2016, and ahead of the all-important SEC Primary on March 1–of which Texas is a part.
The venue for the event, the University of Houston, remains unchanged.
That NBC News lost the debate is significant, and the network will likely end up losing millions in ad revenue because of the RNC’s decision to move forward with formally removing it as its broadcast partner.
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