<p>Democratic candidate Martin O&rsquo;Malley accuses DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz of rigging the debate schedule so that Hillary Clinton will win the primary. O&rsquo;Malley is one of many calling for additional debates. ;</p>
<p>In what is seen as a major victory for Hillary Clinton&rsquo;s Democratic competitors, two top DNC officials (vice chairs Tulsi Gabbard and R.T. Rybak) asked to add more debates to the current schedule. ;</p>
<p>O&rsquo;Malley made an appearance on MSNBC&rsquo;s <em>Morning Joe</em> to discuss the current call for &ldquo;several more debates than the six currently scheduled.&rdquo; MSNBC asks how underdog candidates can hope to compete if they can&rsquo;t get on TV enough times to put their views out there.  ;</p>
<p>&ldquo;More importantly, it&rsquo;s bad for the country and it&rsquo;s political malpractice for our party,&rdquo; said O&rsquo;Malley. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s not what the Republican candidates are doing for us, it&rsquo;s what we&rsquo;re not doing for ourselves. So we need to start having debates and I&rsquo;m so glad those vice chairs of the Democratic Party have stood up and spoken out. It would be unprecedented for us to tell Iowa &lsquo;you can only have one debate before the caucuses&rsquo; or New Hampshire &lsquo;you can only have one debate and, oh by the way, it has to be on a Saturday at the peak of shopping season.&rsquo;&rdquo; ;</p>
<p>&ldquo;What&rsquo;s really going on?&rdquo; interrupted one of the hosts, moving on to ask O&rsquo;Malley if he thinks the process has been rigged by &ldquo;party leaders for Hillary Clinton.&rdquo; ;</p>
<p>O&rsquo;Malley said yes. &#8220;I think you are sore pressed to say &#8216;leaders,&rsquo; but I&#8217;m told this is a prerogative of the chair. And there&rsquo;s always an inclination I think for old relationships to kind of circle the wagons and protect one another.&rdquo; ;</p>
<p>The &lsquo;chair&rsquo; he is referring to is Debbie Wasserman Schultz, House Rep. of the Sunshine State and Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chairwoman. ;</p>
<p>&ldquo;The inevitable frontrunner is not so inevitable,&rdquo; said O&rsquo;Malley, referring to the most recent Iowa poll in which Hillary is one point behind Sanders. ;</p>
<p>O&rsquo;Malley then suggested that former Clinton fans are searching for an anti-establishment leader, one who can only gain popularity if invited to more debates (coincidentally, O&rsquo;Malley has just 3% of the vote).</p>
<p>According to Wasserman Schultz, however, the debate schedule is final and will not be changed. Even worse, &ldquo;The candidates will be uninvited from subsequent debates if they accept an invitation to anything outside of the six sanctioned debates.&rdquo; ;</p>
<p>Wasserman Schultz is under fire for her decision but continues to stand firm. &ldquo;Every day someone is going to say something about my intentions, but I have a party to run,&rdquo; she said, arguing that ;candidates do not have the time or resources to participate in debate after debate. She cited the year 2008 in which there were 24 debates. ;</p>
<p>&ldquo;You can see that our candidates are gaining steam on their own,&#8221; said the chairwoman. &#8220;Look at the crowds Bernie Sanders is drawing. We have not had any debates yet and Bernie Sanders has found a way to really catch fire with our base.&rdquo;</p>
<p>As it stands, the DNC will have only six debates. O&rsquo;Malley continues to fight Wasserman Schultz&#8217;s decision and urges anyone who agrees with him to use the hash tag &ldquo;AllowDebate.&rdquo; ;</p>
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