The 2016 United States presidential debates were a series of debates held for the presidential election. The Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD), a bipartisan organization formed in 1987, organized three debates among the major presidential candidates. The first of these presidential debates took place on September 26, 2016, and set the record as the most-watched debate in American history, with 84 million viewers. The second debate took place on October 9, and the third took place on October 19. All CPD debates occurred from approximately 9 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. EDT (6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. PDT). Only the Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton and the Republican nominee Donald Trump met the criteria for inclusion in the debates, and thus were the only two to appear in the debates sponsored by the Commission on Presidential Debates. The CPD-sponsored vice presidential debate took place on October 4, 2016. Only Democratic nominee Tim Kaine and Republican nominee Mike Pence appeared in it.
Commission on Presidential Debates-sponsored debates
The Commission on Presidential Debates stipulates three criteria for eligibility for the presidential debates: constitutional eligibility to serve as president, appearance on enough ballots to potentially reach 270 electoral votes, and an average at least 15% on five selected national polls. For the vice-presidential debate, the running mates of the presidential candidates qualifying for the first presidential debate will be invited. By mid-September Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, Gary Johnson, and Jill Stein were on enough ballots to reach 270 electoral votes; however, only Clinton and Trump had reached the 15% polling threshold. Johnson and Stein had polled as high as 13% and 7%, respectively, and had an average of 8.3% and 3%, respectively.
On August 15, the CPD announced that it would use the most recent CBS/The New York Times, Fox News, CNN/Opinion Research Corporation, NBC/The Wall Street Journal, and ABC/The Washington Post polls for the debate criteria and that candidates must be at an average of 15% in these polls.
On September 16, the commission announced the official invitation of both Clinton and Trump to participate in the first debate to be held on September 26 at Hofstra University, but Johnson and Stein did not meet the established criteria, and would not be participants in the debate. The commission also confirmed that Clinton and Trump had committed to participate. It was also announced that Mike Pence and Tim Kaine would be participating in the only scheduled vice presidential debate, to take place at Longwood University on October 4. The 15% threshold was reapplied with polling numbers following the first debate in order to judge the participants in the second debate on October 9.
Moderators for the four debates were announced September 2, 2016.
Topics addressed and not addressed
Over the combined six hours of debate time at the three presidential debates and one vice presidential debate, the issues most raised in moderators' questions were the Syrian civil war (six questions) and terrorism (four questions). U.S.-Russia relations, immigration, job creation, Trump's taxes, and Trump's lewd leaked recording controversy were each asked about in three questions, and Clinton's emails, the Supreme Court, Social Security, taxation of the wealthy, the national debt, Iraq, the Affordable Care Act, "uniting the country," nuclear weapons, and the legitimacy of the election, were each the subject of two questions. A number of issues were the subject of a single question, including expectations of police conduct, race relations, abortion, gun policy, "birtherism," jobs in the energy industry, cyberterrorism, Islamophobia, the Clinton Foundation, the Donald J. Trump Foundation, the strengths of the candidates' opponents, the skills of the vice presidential nominees, the candidate's faith, the low favorability ratings of both candidates, the paid speeches given by Clinton, Trump's Twitter posts, Clinton's "basket of deplorables" remark, Clinton's "look," and the candidates' behavior.
The debate moderators failed to ask a question about climate change at any of the three debates, although Clinton did touch on the issue twice as part of responses to other questions. The moderators' failure to address the issue prompted complaints by commentators. David Leonhardt of The New York Times termed it "a failure of journalism" and a "a grievous error." Prominent climate scientists Kerry Emanuel and Michael E. Mann, as well as activist group 350.org, criticized the failure of the debates to address the issue.
A number of other issues were either addressed sparingly or not at all: