Rick Perry Qualifies for CNN South Carolina Debate… Barely

GOP Presidential candidate Rick Perry came extremely close to being excluded from CNN’s upcoming debate in South Carolina. Two weeks ago CNN posted its criteria for inclusion, with a candidate having to achieve one of four criteria in order to participate. Among them: placing in the top four in either Iowa or New Hampshire, or having at least seven percent support in three national or South Carolina polls conducted in January.

According to Talking Points Memo, Perry did not appear to qualify for any of those criteria, but a clarification from CNN DC bureau chief Sam Feist indicates that he did… albeit barely.

Perry was at seven percent in two national polls, but a third poll, from CBS News, asked the same question twice, one of which had him at seven percent, and the other at six percent. Even if it was only six percent, Feist said Perry would have qualified:

“If you average 7, 7 and 6, you get 6.67. And across the board, in polling methodology, you round up to get to the next digit. And so even if you were to insist – even if someone were to insist that we use CBS’s non-traditional methodology, in which case Governor Perry gets a 6, with the other two polls in which he is listed as 7, average to 6.67, yielding a 7.”

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