Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s debate claims ‘very disingenuous,’ Politifact rules

Democratic National Committee chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s claim that her party’s debate schedule was designed to “maximize” candidates’ exposure has been rated as false by Politifact.

Appearing on CNN Sunday, the Florida congresswoman responded to accusations that the DNC scheduled so many debates on a weekend, when viewership is expected to be low, in order to protect Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton from public scrutiny and shield the lesser-know candidates from further exposure.

“There’s no number of debates that will satisfy everyone,” she argued. “So, I did my best to make sure, along with my staff and along with our debate partners, to come up with a schedule that we felt was going to allow for the — to maximize the opportunity for voters to see our candidates.”

But Politifact, the Tampa Bay Times’ fact-checking website, called her claim “very disingenuous.”

“Clearly, we can’t rate what people within the Democratic party intended. Our fact-check looks at what the outcome was,” Politifact reported Wednesday. “Did the Democrats ’maximize the opportunity’ for voters to see their candidates? We found there’s no fair reading of the Democratic debate schedule that supports this.

“There are six Democratic party debates compared with 11 scheduled for the Republicans, and half of the Democratic debates are on weekends — including one the weekend before Christmas and another on the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend. If the Democrats had wanted to ’maximize’ opportunities for viewers, the party could have added more debates, scheduled them on weekdays and avoided holidays.”