1. Chocolate chip wins our holiday cookie election after nine rounds of RCV counting
2. Seven Democrats qualify for Dec. 19 presidential primary debate
3. What’s the Tea?

Chocolate Chip Cookie wins Ballotpedia’s Holiday Cookie election. 

Every cookie candidate put some votes on the board in our first-ever holiday cookie election. The readers have spoken - you love cookies, and many different kinds of cookies. It was a fight to the finish. But, like all elections, someone (or, something) has to win. The winner is...the Chocolate Chip Cookie. 

As a reminder, we used ranked-choice voting (RCV) to score the race. In a ranked-choice vote-counting election, tallying is performed in rounds. Each round, the candidate (or cookie-candidate) with the least amount of votes is eliminated. For the eliminated cookie, each voter’s next available choice is added to the count. 

This election went all the way to the end! In the ninth and final round, Chocolate chip cookie narrowly beat out Sugar cookie, 143 votes to 134. 

In the first round, Chocolate chip received 65 votes, and Sugar cookie, 81. Chocolate chip didn’t take the lead from Sugar cookie until round six. Snowflake was the first cookie to be eliminated.
Note from the Editor in Chief: My personal favorite was eliminated in round 1. I’m going to go eat four more of them to cry myself to sleep.

Representatives from the No-bake Party are protesting the results of this election, as their nominated candidate, Peanut Butter Balls, was disqualified from the ballot. 

Thank you to all of the readers who participated. We were honored to have you join us in this oh-so-important holiday election. We wish you happy baking this holiday season!

Find the complete election results here

       

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Seven Democrats qualify for Dec. 19 presidential primary debate 

Seven presidential candidates—Joe Biden, Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar, Bernie Sanders, Tom Steyer, Elizabeth Warren, and Andrew Yang—qualified for the next Democratic primary debate on Dec. 19. Candidates had to meet both polling and fundraising requirements by yesterday—Dec. 12—to qualify. 

Two candidates who participated in the most recent debate on Nov. 20—Cory Booker and Tulsi Gabbard—did not qualify. Kamala Harris qualified for the debate but ended her presidential campaign Dec. 3.  

Each candidate had to receive 4% support or more in at least four national or early state polls or 6% support or more in at least two single state polls to meet the debate’s polling threshold. The four early states are Iowa (Feb. 3), New Hampshire (Feb. 11), Nevada (Feb. 22), and South Carolina (Feb. 29). Candidates also had to meet a fundraising threshold of 200,000 unique donors and a minimum of 800 donors in at least 20 states. Gabbard met the fundraising threshold but was one poll shy of meeting the polling criteria.

Thursday’s debate will take place at the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs in Los Angeles. PBS NewsHour and Politico are hosting the event and Judy Woodruff, Tim Alberta, Amna Nawaz, and Yamiche Alcindor will be the moderators. 

Six more debates are planned for the Democratic Party's presidential primary. The Democratic National Committee announced on Thursday the dates and locations of the next four debates. Here is the schedule of those debates, along with the dates of the early state primaries: 

• January 14, 2020 (debate in Des Moines, Iowa)

• February 3, 2020 - Iowa caucuses

• February 7, 2020 (debate in Manchester, New Hampshire)

• February 11, 2020 - New Hampshire primary

• February 19, 2020 (debate in Las Vegas, Nevada)

• February 22, 2020 - Nevada caucuses

• February 25, 2020 (debate in Charleston, South Carolina)

• February 29, 2020 - South Carolina primary

With less than two weeks to go before the holidays, I’ve already started thinking about spending time with family and friends later this month. Whether you’re busy baking, decorating, or sending holiday greetings, we hope you’re enjoying getting ready for the holiday season.

At Ballotpedia, we’re also thinking about resting and recharging for the months ahead. Next year—2020—will be such a busy year in politics, what with the presidential race, 35 U.S. Senate contests, and elections in every U.S. House district as well as in thousands of state legislative districts in 44 states. Not to mention the tens of thousands of local elections across the nation. We’ve been working hard to get ready for all that and more so we can bring you all the important political news and information you’re looking for. I can’t wait to get started!

But first, we want to know about your plans this holiday season. Some folks travel near and far to get together with loved ones, while others—like myself—do the hosting. And some do both! So this week’s survey question is: Are you traveling for the holidays? 

• Yes→

• No→

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