MSNBC announces four all-star female moderators for November debate

Image; Ashley Parker, Kirsten Welker, Rachel maddow, Andrea Mitchell
Ashley Parker, Kirsten Welker, Rachel Maddow & Andrea Mitchell Copyright NBC
Copyright NBC
By Dareh Gregorian with NBC News Politics
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The two-hour Democratic face off will take place on Nov. 20 in Georgia.

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The fifth Democratic presidential primary debate in Georgia will have four moderators, MSNBC announced on Wednesday — and all of them are women.

Moderating the Nov. 20th event, which is being co-hosted by MSNBC and The Washington Post, will be Rachel Maddow, host of The Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC, Andrea Mitchell, host of Andrea Mitchell Reports on MSNBC and NBC News chief foreign Affairs correspondent, Kristen Welker, NBC News White House correspondent, and Ashley Parker, Washington Post White House Reporter.

The debate will likely feature a smaller lineup of candidates than the dozen who qualified for October's debate in Ohio — only eight candidates have qualified for the debate stage so far, according to an unofficial NBC News tally. It will also be shorter than the three-hour October debate— it's scheduled to air between 9 and 11 p.m. ET.

It will air live on MSNBC and Radio One. It will also stream on MSNBC.com and the Post's website, as well as across mobile devices via NBC News and the Post's mobile apps and Urban One's digital platforms.

The city, venue and format will be announced at a later date, according to MSNBC.

To qualify for the stage, candidates have to meet fundraising and polling criteria laid out by the Democratic National Committee by one week before the debate.

Those benchmarks include hitting at least 3 percent in four qualifying state or national polls or 5 percent in two qualifying state polls. The fundraising threshold requires candidates to have received contributions from 165,000 unique donors, including 600 unique donors in 20 states.

The eight candidates who appear to have qualified to date are former Vice President Joe Biden, New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg, California Sen. Kamala Harris, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, billionaire Tom Steyer, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and entrepreneur Andrew Yang.

Four other candidates appear to have reached the fundraising threshold, but are still short in the polling criteria. Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar has qualified in 3 of 4 necessary polls, former Texas Rep. Beto O'Rourke in 2 and Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard in one.

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