UPDATE: Andrew Yang Kicked Out of September Debate Less Than 24 Hours After Being Accepted

Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang is not giving up without a fight after the Democratic National Committee rejected one of his polls to qualify for the debate in September.

Less than 24 hours after announcing he qualified for the third and fourth Democratic primary debates scheduled for the fall, Yang received an email from the DNC on Tuesday telling him that he didn’t submit four polls that proved he received at least 2%.

Two polls submitted by Yang, a July 11 poll from NBC and The Wall Street Journal and a July 19 poll by NBC and SurveyMonkey, was only considered as one poll because both were conducted by NBC, the Hill reported.

“Candidates may only count one NBC-sponsored national poll released during the current qualification period,” DNC senior adviser Mary Beth Cahill told Yang in the email.

To qualify, candidates must receive at least 2% in four qualifying polls and have 130,000 unique donors, including a minimum of 400 per state in at least 20 states.

Yang, who met the donor requirement in June, reached the polling threshold on Monday, securing him a spot in the upcoming debates.

Following the rejection, campaign manager Zach Graumann sent an email to Yang’s supporters, writing, “The political establishment is stacking the deck against us.”

“We have a plan — increase name recognition and polling numbers by getting Andrew’s message in front of as many voters as possible. That means a whole new game: TV ads,” the email continued. “That’s right! We need you to help us take our message to television. Our Humanity First campaign needs you to fight back harder than you ever have before. Give $20, give $50, or give $100. Give what you can to make sure that we can hit our 7-day, $300,000 goal and flood the airwaves in early states with Andrew’s message.”

The email went on to say that the Yang campaign knew that the Democratic primary won’t always be “fair,” adding that they also knew how “this game is played.”

“Through being left off of a media outlet’s graphic, through a muted microphone, through a revoked poll — you have been with us every step of the way,” the email read. “You’ve proven that our Yang Gang is unstoppable and that there is nothing we can’t accomplish. Let’s keep proving the experts wrong.”

So far, only seven candidates have qualified for the debate in September.

“By the DNC’s own rules, the Wall Street Journal, NBC News, Fox News, and Quinnipiac are all approved organizations, and thus Andrew Yang has qualified for the fall debates. We disagree with the DNC decision and are disappointed with the ruling,” Graumann later said in a statement to the Hill.

“It is frustrating to see the rules be changed mid-game, but our campaign has overcome every obstacle placed in our path, and we will continue to upset the establishment well into 2020.”

Image via Getty

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