This post has been updated.
After threatening to boycott the nest Republican presidential debate held by CNBC, Donald Trump said on Friday morning that the network had agreed to limit the debate to two hours.
.@CNBC has just agreed that the debate will be TWO HOURS. Fantastic news for all, especially the millions of people who will be watching!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 16, 2015
CNN reported that the Republican National Committee began calling candidates on Friday morning to inform them that CNBC had agreed to limit the debate to two hours.
Trump and Ben Carson on Thursday sent a letter to CNBC demanding that the network limit the debate to just two hours and allow candidates to give opening and closing statements. The two Republican presidential candidates said they would not attend the debate unless their demands were met.
The boycott threat followed a chaotic phone call between the Republican National Committee and representatives for the candidates. According to Politico, aides for Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) demanded that CNBC include opening and closing remarks. And staffers for former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) said their bosses would attend the debate no matter what.
CNBC said on Thursday said that the format for the debate had not yet been finalized.
“Our goal is to host the most substantive debate possible. Our practice in the past has been to forego opening statements to allow more time to address the critical issues that matter most to the American people,” CNBC Spokesman Brian Steel said, according to Politico. “We started a dialogue yesterday with all of the campaigns involved, and we will certainly take the candidate’s views on the format into consideration as we finalize the debate structure.”
CNBC did not immediately respond to TPM’s Friday morning request for comment.
