Opinion: Breaking News: Kucinich sues NBC over Nevada debate
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Rep. Dennis Kucinich has just sued NBC-TV in Las Vegas over his exclusion from the MSNBC debate among top Demcoratic candidates in Nevada tomorrow.
According to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Kucinich filed his lawsuit moments ago seeking a temporary restraining order allowing him to participate in the nationally-televised debate among Hillary Clinton, John Edwards and Barack Obama. A copy of the lawsuit is available here.
As reported here over the weekend, Kucinich was originally informed that he was invited. But that invitation was later rescinded, prompting an outraged press release about giant corporate powers controlling voters’ access to all candidates.
Kucinich’s lawsuit claims, “Kucinich is a credible and serious candidate in Nevada, where he is actively and vigorously campaigning and has statewide headquarters in Las Vegas.” The suit could threaten tomorrow evening’s debate.
It comes just days before the hotly-contested Nevada caucuses that has drawn all the Democratic candidates, seeking votes and endorsements. A District Court hearing was scheduled for this afternoon.
Kucinich’s exclusion from Tuesday’s debate is the ....
latest of several. The perennial president candidate from Cleveland was also barred from participating in the ABC-TV-Facebook debate in New Hampshire and the Des Moines Register debate in Iowa.
Also Fox News excluded Republican Rep. Ron Paul from its GOP debate just before last week’s New Hampshire primary, even though it did include Rudy Giuliani, whom Paul had beaten in Iowa, and Fred Thompson, who wasn’t campaigning in New Hampshire and was trailing Paul in polls there. Paul was also in Nevada today campaigning.
--Andrew Malcolm