Talk:2016 Democratic Party presidential candidates/Archive 1

Please add Luis Gutierrez
He is a potential democratic candidate for 2016. Here are the sources:

http://politics.suntimes.com/article/washington/luis-gutierrez-president-latino-activists-may-draft-him/tue-10072014-1214pm ; http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/oct/7/immigration-activists-court-luis-gutierrez-for-pre/?page=all ; http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2014/10/07/Luis-2016-Amnesty-Advocates-Readying-Draft-Gutierrez-Movement ; http://politics.suntimes.com/article/washington/hispanic-activists-pushing-rep-gutierrez-2016-presidential-draft/thu-10232014 ; — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ruby XL (talk • contribs) 17:13, 24 October 2014 (UTC)

✅ by User:NDACFan.--JayJasper (talk) 20:01, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

Howard Dean -- potential candidate or no?
Should Howard Dean be moved out of the potential candidates section? There have been several articles in the last few months detailing his support for an assumed Hillary Clinton candidacy.

Here is a CNN article, and a Politico article written by Dean himself.

I understand that in the slim chance Hillary doesn't run, he might be considered a potential candidate. But for now he seems to be strongly behind a Clinton candidacy.

HorsemaskWarlord (talk) 17:11, 24 March 2015 (UTC)
 * We have always considered a potential candidate to be "declined" when they endorse another candidate who is officially running. Since Hillary is not yet officially a candidate, Dean's endorsement of her impending candidacy dosen't disqualify him as a potential candidate.--NextUSprez (talk) 15:10, 31 March 2015 (UTC)

Please remove George Clooney and Elizabeth Warren
Clooney because he is not a serious candidate and discredits this page as a serious page and Warren has declined to run http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2013/12/04/elizabeth-warren-presidential-race-2016-senate-term/3871349/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.93.202.86 (talk • contribs) 21:23, 21 November 2014‎ (UTC)

❌ Clooney has received speculation in reputable sources like Time Magazine, and meets the stated criteria for listing as a potential candidate (speculation in multiple secondary RS's). While it may be highly doubtful he'll actually run in 2016, it's not the task of wikipedia editors to impose our own ideas of who is and isn't a "serious" candidate when listing potential candidates. Rather, we include those meet the consensus-based benchmark based on reliable media speculation. For better or worse, Clooney meets that benchmark, and that's why he's listed.

As for Warren, she was previously listed as "Declined" based on her stated denials like the one in the link you posted. However, she was re-added to the "Other potential" list when she recently made statements that softened her stance from the shermanesque statements she had made earlier:, ,  .--NextUSprez (talk) 19:22, 13 December 2014 (UTC)


 * Here are three more recent links, where she says 6 times she's not running.   Now that Hillary has officially announced I think this issue can and should be put to bed. I'm moving her to Declined.  Nevermore27  (talk) 21:32, 12 April 2015 (UTC)

If Hillary doesn't run links
Should these types of links be kept? Hillary is officially running- so links asking what it'll look like if she doesn't seem kinda pointless. So- should the links (and the candidates associated with them if that's all they have) be removed or kept on? Vote 4 DJH2036 (talk) 12:11, 23 April 2015 (UTC)
 * I agree that those links are now "pointless" and should no longer be considered valid sources for citing potential candidates.--NextUSprez (talk) 22:13, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Vermin Supreme link
The link under my name is incorrect. The correct address of my camPain is http://www.verminsupreme2016.com Thank you, ponies, 2601:6:700:998:21E:52FF:FE74:944 (talk) 03:05, 22 January 2015 (UTC)vermin


 * ✅--JayJasper (talk) 04:52, 22 January 2015 (UTC)


 * Should be removed. Not filed with the FEC and not notable enough to be included.  Is more a publicity stunt than anything else.- Xcuref1endx (talk) 01:55, 9 April 2015 (UTC)
 * If you believe he's not notable enough then why don't you nominate his article for deletion? I assure you it will be kept.  That's the notability criteria.--William S. Saturn (talk) 18:18, 10 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Apples and oranges. We aren't talking about notability to have an article.  We are talking about whether they should be listed here.  The "other candidates" section seems to exist for no other reason than for the self promotion of eccentric candidates who do not get national coverage which then gives their sources undue weight. -Xcuref1endx (talk) 19:53, 18 April 2015 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is now a moot point, at least as far as this page is concerned, because Supreme has been moved to United States third party and independent presidential candidates, 2016 per this discussion.--NextUSprez (talk) 15:07, 25 April 2015 (UTC)

Running for another office
Running for another office does not mean a candidate has declined running for President (see Rand Paul), hence candidates cannot be moved from previous to declined for this reason alone.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2015/02/18/rand_paul_2016_election_law_how_kentucky_senator_can_run_for_re_election.htmlObieGrad (talk) 15:12, 20 May 2015 (UTC)

Lincoln Chaffee's Clip on Real Time with Bill Maher
I'm not sure why the clip of Lincoln Chaffee answering the question, "What are you going to be doing in six months?" with, "Running for president," has been deleted, and the fact that he is only the second person to say he is running for president after Hillary Clinton needs editing. It's not original research. The clip here was broadcast on HBO and uploaded by the show, and in it, he says both that he's formed an exploratory committee and that he is definitely running. It's not speculation, and it's straight from the horse's mouth. That's something none of the other three recent citations can say. The oldest citation should be deleted, and the Real Time clip should be the second citation. -- JCaesar (talk) 20:01, 21 May 2015 (UTC)
 * I can't speak for anyone else who might have deleted it, but I did so partly because published sources are preferred to video clips (or so I thought, I may be wrong) and also because the more recent source I added quotes him “I hope to make an announcement before mid-June and certainly I am leaning very heavily in that direction” in response to the question "Are you running for president?". "Heavily leaning in that direction" seems to be a bit of walking back from his earlier assertions of "definitely" running. Given the lack of consistency (albeit slight) in his responses to inquiries about whether he is running or not, it seems best to leave out statements like "has said he intends to run" and just cite the formal actions (forming exploratory committee) he's taken so far. At least, that's how I see it.--Earlgrey T (talk) 18:44, 22 May 2015 (UTC)

The order candidates are listed
Is it a standard that the names be alphabetical, or would it make more sense to have them listed in the order they announced? Chadlupkes (talk) 15:41, 9 June 2015 (UTC)


 * That's been the consensus for all political election pages. I say stick with alphabetical. It's an easy standard that everyone understands. I could foresee a problem where it's not actually clear when someone announces, such as Sen. Sanders, who announced he was running for President two weeks before his official campaign announcement event. Alphabetical keeps it simple.--Vrivasfl (talk) 19:32, 9 June 2015 (UTC)
 * UNTIL THERE ARE RESULTS, it's best to keep it alphabetical. Afterwards, change it to delegate strength.12:30, 3 July 2015 (UTC)

No, the order of running is better. Alphabetical is worse because it furthers lifelong discrimination of people with names like Mr. Young and Mrs. Zulu.

If there is an ambiguous date because of multiple announcements, this can be dealt with. Dharahara (talk) 17:30, 3 July 2015 (UTC)


 * You are messing around about the first sentence, right Dharahara? Alphabetical is fine; you can switch their announcements and their names now, so it kind of is a mute point.  I agree with Ericl though- once Delegates become assigned, then we can order by delegates.  Vote 4 DJH2036 (talk) 21:34, 3 July 2015 (UTC)

Website links are official links under WP:EL
WP:EL states: "Official links (if any) are provided to give the reader the opportunity to see what the subject says about itself." Moreover, the links are included in lists and not embedded in the prose of the article, which is what WP:EL frowns upon. See WP:EL

I agree with User:Ultrastarwarsfan who tried to reinsert the links removed by User:Stesmo. The links should be readded to the lists per WP:EL.--William S. Saturn (talk) 18:31, 5 July 2015 (UTC)


 * Hello, ! 's edit duplicated all or most of the article and needed to be reverted no matter what one thinks of External Links. I'm sure we can all agree with that.
 * Now, on to the WP:EL discussion. Official Links are for the subject of the article. So, the Official Link for the article about BigSportsEvent2016 would point to the sports event's Official website, but not the teams in BigSportsEvent2016 or in the playoffs. The subject of this article is "Democratic Party presidential candidates, 2016" and a link to CandidateX For 2016! isn't the subject of this article. Now, on each of the Wikipedia articles for the candidates (which are linked to from this article), they will undoubtedly have an official website link to their personal website (which also undoubtedly will link to their CandidateX For 2016! page). If there isn't an official website that the candidate controls listed on the Wikipedia article for that candidate, then the CandidateX For 2016 link would make a suitable external official link on the candidate's Wikipedia article.
 * As to WP:EL, if you're curious, this section was recently edited and our discussion about what should be reflected in this section is still in the EL Talk page. However, the key part of WP:EL is that clarifying whether or not EL *sections* should be be allowed on "Lists of" articles (for example) and stating that "However, the lists themselves should not be composed of external links". WP:EL is about keeping external links out of the body of the article and keeping them restricted to the Infobox (in the case of stock tickers, official websites...), in Further Reading (as ISBNs, etc.) and the EL section. And, for the ELs that do make their way to the EL section, minimizing the number and maximizing the ones selected by making sure they are improving the encyclopedic knowledge of the subject / "contain neutral and accurate material that is relevant to an encyclopedic understanding of the subject and cannot be integrated into the Wikipedia article due to copyright issues, amount of detail (such as professional athlete statistics, movie or television credits, interview transcripts, or online textbooks), or other reasons".
 * Upon consideration, I believe I was too hasty in removing the single FEC external link and can see it being added back as it seems to meet WP:EL for this article. Thoughts?
 * 2016 Presidential Form 2 Filers at the Federal Election Commission (FEC)
 * Thanks, Stesmo (talk) 19:29, 5 July 2015 (UTC)
 * I disagree that this is anything like a sporting event. There is no single official website for the candidates altogether.  There is a collection of official websites (one for each candidate/subject) and those official websites are essential parts of each campaign.  This is also a highly contentious topic and so the reader should be given "the opportunity to see what the subject [or subjects] says about itself." --William S. Saturn (talk) 20:08, 5 July 2015 (UTC)
 * Hi, . I agree with you: there is no Official website for the article's subject. So, no Official website can be added to this article. Can we agree that the 5 candidates that were in the EL section are wikilinked to Wikipedia articles about them? Yes? If so, then the reader is given the opportunity to read more about the candidate on Wikipedia *and* from there, click on the Official website links to a site controlled by that person. If those articles/biographies lack a link to someplace where the reader has "the opportunity to see what the subject [or subjects] says about itself", then an EL to the CandidateX for 2016! could be added there. Thanks! Stesmo (talk) 20:25, 5 July 2015 (UTC)
 * I understand what you are saying.--William S. Saturn (talk) 22:16, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

Democratic Party presidential candidates, 2016
Today is July 17, 2015. It is my understanding that another Democratic candidate has announced his candidacy, his name is Dr. Raul Ruiz, and that is also the name of his beginner webpage. I wanted to bring this up because I think Dr. Ruiz would make an excellent candidate, he and his activities are interesting, and I cannot for the life of me understand why he is not listed. I want him "out there," so I figured plenty of people come to Wikipedia for information, and I want to be sure Dr. Ruiz gets in there. You all will have to do the work of verifying his candidacy. Thank you so much. gailgregory@care2.com — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.243.169.219 (talk) 12:18, 17 July 2015 (UTC)
 * I assume this is the person you're referring to? I did an internet news search and didn't find anything about him announcing his candidacy for the presidency. We will need reliable secondary sources to verify that he's a candidate before he can be listed. If and when such sources become available, he will be added to the candidate listings.--Rollins83 (talk) 16:19, 17 July 2015 (UTC)


 * I can't find anything at all on Ruiz running for president. The only thing I have on him is a potential Senate run in 2016.  There is no statement from anywhere that I've seen that even says he's being considered or considering running for President.  Not sure where exactly you're getting this information.  If you have a source leave it please.  Otherwise- we can't put him on the page.  Vote 4 DJH2036 (talk) 20:21, 19 July 2015 (UTC)

Party switching
Of the 5 major candidates, three have former associations with the Republican party. Chafee served as U.S. senator and Governor of Rhode Island as a Republican. Clinton was president of her college's Young Republicans, and she campaigned for Barry Goldwater. Jim Webb was appointed by Ronald Reagan as Assistant Secretary of Defense and Secretary of the Navy.

In addition, this is Sanders' first campaign as a Democrat. He has been an independent in the U.S. House and Senate.

Is this notable enough for inclusion? Clearly there is a lot of party switching on the Democratic side. 71.89.32.89 (talk) 15:52, 26 July 2015 (UTC)
 * Actually, Chafee was a Republican as a senator, but switched to independent before being elected governor and then became a Democrat during his term as governor. But the fact that Chafee and Webb used to serve in office as Republicans, and Chafee and Sanders have served in office as independents, is kind of interesting. The Clinton Republican connection, though, is tenuous. She hasn't been a Republican at any time since she was old enough to vote. (Hillary Clinton turned 21, the then-voting age, in October 1968, by which time she was already a Democrat.) Trying to list her as one of the former Republicans in the Democratic campaign would be stretching a point. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 06:32, 12 August 2015 (UTC)

Mrs. Clinton's head is too big
...compared to the others. Please fix if you can. Dharahara (talk) 17:31, 3 July 2015 (UTC)


 * ✅ Thanks, an appropriate size now. -- AstroU (talk) 20:58, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

Jeff Boss, current position
I'm thinking of changing the description of "Jeff Boss" from saying perennial candidate, to saying what our article calls him, and what the wp:rs tend to call him. He's dubbed a conspiracy theorist in the title of the vice.com piece, but called simply a presidential candidate in the prose (and mayoral candidate). He's called a "well-known" conspiracy theorist and two-time presidential candidate in the first sentence of politickerNJ.com, and also dubs him a '9/11 truther' but in scarequotes, plus mentions the mayor-run as well. They go on to say this: "In fact, he’s something of a perennial candidate..." and give a list of other races he's run. The most mainstream source is wsj.com, and it is also the source which most carefully refuses to characterize him in any specific fashion, noting that he "...developed elaborate theories connecting the NSA and 9-11, [then] started campaigning—first for president, then for Senate and Congress. In 2009, he captured 8% of the gubernatorial democratic primary vote. He points to a framed ballot from the 2012 presidential election... he's mainly spent the last five years [2008 thru 2012 inclusive] campaigning seven days a week..." but not specifically calling him by any job-title noun save "declared candidate... earns a little money working as a travel agent ...also runs a cryogenics outfit". Anyways, maybe other sources exist, these are just the first three that turned up in some WP:GOOG efforts on this particular Jeff Boss. (Unfortunately there is also the Jeff Boss who was on SEAL Team Six, and the Jeff Boss who runs an automotive corporation, and the Jeff Boss who was WP:DBTF so quite possibly I missed some of the WP:RS by mistake.) To be specific, I suggest we change from this:


 * Perennial candidate, 9/11 Truther

To instead simply this, which matches our BLP description, and is more-closely supported by our sources:


 * Conspiracy theorist

Or even this alternative wikilink:


 * Conspiracy theorist

Along similar lines, I've already changed the job-title for Harry Braun from 'perennial candidate' (which unlike for Jeff Boss wasn't something that I could find even vaguely cited) into the more NPOV-and-BLP-compliant phrase "Energy consultant" since that is the kind of work he actually does. There is more room for calling Jeff Boss a perennial candidate, since as the WSJ says, he's basically been running for office seven days a week, since 2008 or thereabouts, whatever office enough 'elect Jeff Boss' signatures can be collected to get on the ballot, at least. We also have a specific source, politickerNJ.com, which specifically calls Jeff Boss "something of a perennial candidate" quote unquote. Still, unless we have a better wiki-reliable source for that description, I'd prefer to have the "current/previous position" column for him say what has been reliably sourced, which is conspiracy theorist, with a wikilink to 9/11 Truther which explains the specific type of conspiracy theorist that the candidate is. I'd also be okay with simply wikilinking the 'conspiracy theorist' job-title to the Jeff Boss article, for maximal exactness about the type of conspiracy theorist this particular BLP represents. 75.108.94.227 (talk) 20:50, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

Georgia outline and flag...
That's the country, not the state. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.106.189.11 (talk) 22:24, 30 August 2015 (UTC)


 * I know what the heck. Someone is really bad at geography. AvRand (talk) 00:13, 31 August 2015 (UTC)
 * That would be me, sorry about that. :-)      I just tweaked the imagefile-link from "Arizona" to instead "Georgia" since the candidate moved from Arizona to Georgia in 2012... but I'm pretty sure they moved to the state of Georgia, not the nation of Georgia.  WP:DBTF applies.  75.108.94.227 (talk) 14:59, 31 August 2015 (UTC)
 * Okay, maybe fixed now. Ping AvRand, can you please check my new attempt at geography?  And please remember, you are free to be WP:BOLD about fixing such screwups in mainspace, if you wish.  :-)      Anyways, I think it is fixed now, but maybe I'd better get a second opinion, since I thought it looked "just fine" beforehand when it was showing the wrong nation.  Thanks for the good eyes, 75.108.94.227 (talk) 15:06, 31 August 2015 (UTC)

Bloomberg
Michael Bloomberg is listed under both "Other potential candidates" and "Declined". Seems like it should be one or the other. --71.105.96.33 (talk) 05:45, 6 September 2015 (UTC)

'preliminary' campaign PAC
Braun'16 filed with the FEC in late May, and has been using his PAC website http://democracyAmendmentUSA.net as the main website since then. His campaign is formally launching in September, though, and the official campaign website is http://BraunforPresident.US, wherein the content (not just the URL) is distinct. See also, Bush'16 where the PAC was carrying the weight from Dec'14 through June'15, after which the "official" campaign was launched. In the updated FEC documentation, Braun'16 is listed with an official campaign committee, and with DemocracyAmendmentUSA as their officially-affiliated-PAC-entity. Should wikipedia list an external link to the campaign-website, and the FEC-filing? Or should we list the campaign-website, PAC-website, and the FEC-filing?

WP:NOTPROMOTION tends to suggest we not list the PAC website, but look at e.g. the Perry'16 example, where his official campaign is now a shoestring with most of the paid staffers no longer receiving pay, and the affiliated PAC is doing most of the work. Although this is not applicable in Braun's case, also note that some campaigns in 2016 have four or more PACs, e.g. Ted Cruz presidential campaign, 2016 has four and Hillary Clinton presidential campaign, 2016 has at least three affiliated entities. Anyways, in updating the Braun entry to point to his official campaign website, I originally was going to *continue* listing his 'preliminary' campaign PAC, since he used that as his main campaign website from May through September 2015 ... but have taken it out for the moment, and just list the 'main' official campaign website, pending wider discussion.

Ought we list PACs, since they are becoming extremely crucial to presidential campaigns? Or should we just link to the 'main' website... which for Braun'16 was a PAC from May thru August and during September switched to the official campaign site... and let the main website link to PACs? 75.108.94.227 (talk) 10:57, 7 September 2015 (UTC)

Harry Braun
I removed the "formal announcement expected Sept. 7, 2015" for Harry Braun, because it's Sept. 9 already. Not only could I find no news sources to confirm any formal announcement by Braun, but I didn't see any mention of a Sept. 7 announcement on his own website http://www.braunforpresident.us/. So if he held a formal announcement, some source will need to be provided to confirm that. In addition, I don't think that any candidate should get to claim multiple announcement dates anyway. But even if you do think a candidate should be able to claim multiple announcement dates, you ought to be able to provide evidence of a formal announcement by Braun on Sept. 7 before including that in the table. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 22:36, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

Jerry Brown
http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2015/09/democrats-draft-jerry-brown-why-not

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/jerry-brown-considering-running-president_1031871.html — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:14F:8003:DAFC:1116:EF8D:59E1:7851 (talk) 12:32, 18 September 2015 (UTC)

Larry Lessig
Since Larry Lessig announced his candidacy today (see ), I moved him to the "Other candidates" section. He has been listed in one independent nationwide poll that I can find (Public Pollicy Polling, see ). If he gets listed in five or more polls, he should be moved to the "Candidates featured in major polls" section. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 15:32, 6 September 2015 (UTC)
 * Lessig's FEC filing should be added to the table when it is available. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 03:19, 7 September 2015 (UTC)
 * Naming-note, he is usually called 'Lawrence Lessig' that I have seen over the years. His exploratory-campaign-website calls him Larry Lessig, though.  75.108.94.227 (talk) 10:44, 7 September 2015 (UTC)

Lessig has now been included in five national polls (see the national polling page). Time to list him as a major candidate? --Geoffrey.mcgee (talk) 15:55, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

Jim Webb is now Switching Presidental Bid to Independent
Jim Webb is likely to switch his Party to Independent right now? 2606:A000:85E7:4E00:8925:D4F3:B9B6:6A3D (talk) 03:08, 20 October 2015 (UTC)
 * It is already mentioned on the main page. See United States presidential election, 2016.  Until it is confirmed there really isn't much for us to do on this article. --Stabila711 (talk) 03:10, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

Other candidates
I removed the sentence above the "Other candidates" that said, "None have been listed in any poll, major or otherwise." Lawrence Lessig has been included in a Public Policy Polling poll; see, page 131. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 01:59, 19 September 2015 (UTC)
 * Some news for Lessig fans: He has been included in two more national polls: NBC News/Survey Monkey (see page 4) and Fox News (see page 3). --Metropolitan90 (talk) 03:10, 25 September 2015 (UTC)
 * I think it gets really tricky because if he is mentioned in polls, and receives polling, along with $1M in funding, will the DNC sanction his candidacy? He has 4x as much money as Chafee had at Q2 reporting date, so if the DNC doesn't recognize him as a 'real' candidate, per say, we shouldn't include him unless he receives a significant amount of polling and/or wins or does quite well in primaries. These polls have included Governor Cuomo and Senator Gillibrand, but neither are actually candidates, but may poll better than Lessig.  Spartan7W   &sect;   04:18, 25 September 2015 (UTC)
 * We have been running off the five major polls criteria. If Lessig hits five he should be included according to the critera that we are using for the other candidates.  Unless we change the criteria we cannot exclude Lessig just because he isn't recognized by the DNC if he meets the requirements, especially since he is a declared candidate. --Stabila711 (talk) 04:27, 25 September 2015 (UTC)
 * I agree with Stabila. We have established a standard here going back to April which says that declared candidates who have been listed in at least five national polls are considered major candidates. If Lessig meets that standard but fails to meet the standards imposed by the DNC or other organizations, we shouldn't change the standard just to exclude him. (In fact, the Democratic National Committee's web site doesn't currently include a list of recognized Democratic candidates, as far as I can tell.) The only reason we don't list Cuomo or Gillibrand in the "Candidates featured in major polls" section is that they aren't candidates -- the same as for Joe Biden, who is listed in most polls but isn't a candidate yet either. If Biden, Cuomo, or Gillibrand declares their candidacy, they will get promoted directly to "Candidates featured in major polls". --Metropolitan90 (talk) 04:54, 25 September 2015 (UTC)
 * Now that both parties have had formal debates, the main page standard has been changed to "at least one debate". Parties sanction and sponsor these debates, and candidates who are not invited to participate in at least one debate don't have the support of the same National Committee which will be nominating a nominee next year. This is a reasonable and fair standard.   Spartan7W   &sect;   15:22, 16 October 2015 (UTC)
 * I see that the discussion of this took place, or is taking place, at Talk:United States presidential election, 2016. I disagree with the standard you are describing, but I will comment on it at the other talk page later. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 15:26, 16 October 2015 (UTC)
 * No way. There is no consensus for this change here or anywhere. I am reverting until such. The relevant standard here is WP:DUE, not editors' judgments of who the DNC wants to exclude or who has a chance at being elected. -hugeTim (talk) 17:21, 16 October 2015 (UTC)

withdrawn and declined candidates
Currently we have Biden listed in the 'received speculation' section, which is collapsed-by-default for PC-based readers (due to a software problem it is open-by-default for tablet-and-phone-based readership at present). Should we list Biden more prominently? I think the answer is yes, but rather than move him to a new subsection ("major potential-candidates who received extra-significant coverage" or somesuch), I think we can use a table.

According to the polling, Biden was in a strong third place with ~16% compared to ~25% Sanders and ~49% Clinton. His media-coverage was pretty constant. A few days later, wikipedia erases Biden from the aggregate polling-averages on the polling-page, and hides his name away in the collapsed-box on the candidates-page. Per the comment by User:Hugetim above (which I fully agree with) about trying to closely obey WP:UNDUE, this seems like a mistake to me.

So the question becomes, how can we best represent candidates that polled well, had relevant experience, got plenty of press-coverage not just early on but well into the election-cycle, then ended up now running? Somewhat similarly, on the repub side we have the case of Scott Walker who polled well, had relevant experience, got plenty of press-coverage, but ended up dropping out two months after formally launching (or seven months after PAC-launching). Among the dems, wikipedia currently just alphabetizes the former-speculation and the declined-to-run people, as if they had no impact on the race whatsoever.

This is wrong, of course, and one can see that Elizabeth Warren had significantly more impact on the race than (to pick on a specific name in our current list) William H. McRaven. Maybe we can use a timeline, that shows an indication of the coverage being received by various candidates during various months leading up to the fall 2015 debates? Nothing against the former admiral, o'course, I liked his viral commencement-speech video as much as the next person, but although he was the subject of WP:RS speculation as a veep choice, back in mid-2014, there does not seem to be WP:RS coverage of speculation about McRaven as a potus candidate, except once in August 2014... and that once was WP:BLOGS by redlink Bernie Quigley, as opposed to WP:RS ("views expressed by Contributors are their own and not the views of The Hill"). The other cite in mainspace for McCraven was Culturemap.com, which spoke of legit veep speculation, and also mentioned the probably-not-legit-RS potus-speculation by Quigley. By stark contrast, when you do a bit of WP:GOOG for elizabeth warren president campaign and similar variations, you find more than a single nominally-RS hit.  In timeline-table form, by quarters:

I suggest we put something like that into mainspace, for all the declined-and-speculated-about candidates, to give an idea of how much ink was spilled about them. This is WP:DUE methinks: the NYT lists Warren/Biden/Romney as 'major' candidates who are Not Running... whereas right now, wikipedia just lumps all declined-to-run folks together. The color-coded quarterly timeline-table is my attempt to give an NPOV indication of which potential candidates who in the end declined to run were 'major' factors, in terms of WP:CONTINUEDCOVERAGE and which were blips. That said, though I think McRaven'16 was never a big factor, I'm not sure he ought to be removed from the list, it depends on whether the local zine CultureMap is considered WP:RS with respect to their mention of a potential McRaven'16 attempt.

p.s. More practically/pragmatically, with small screen-sizes in mind, we could alternatively cut the table-size in half by doing biannual columns:

p.p.s. For candidates in the speculation-and-declined listings that were listed in major polls, we could give their average biannual polling-percentages as well, if that would improve the readership's understanding; Biden was polling in double-digits through October 2015, Warren was polling in double digits through May 2015, Romney was polling in double-digits through February 2015, Palin was in high-single-digits through February 2014, and so on. 75.108.94.227 (talk) 13:13, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

Rocky and friends
As the "ballot access" phase of campaign has started and it seems that two "unnotables" have managed to get on the ballot in two states, and one, Rocky de La Fuente, who's kind of kind of shady, is already on three. So that means that he and a retiree named Valentine can get on the ballot in Arizona without having to get signatures. How many states makes one notable? YoursT (talk) 23:04, 13 November 2015 (UTC)

Consensus on the Minor Candidates
Okay, as to the question of the current "edit war", let's discuss what the consensus is:

The consensus was, as far as I know, that everyone on a ballot deserves to be mentioned on all but the main election page. This is a form of notability and an achievement that should be acknowledged. This was done in the last cycle and most of the ones before.

Go here, here or go here and you will see that last time, Wikipedia's articles were inclusive and encyclopedic.

Does this mean that anyone who's spent the thousand bucks to get on the NH ballots deserves an article? Heck, NO! Do those who managed to get on two? That's more problematic. But three or more has usually been the case.

For 2020, as here I suggest the rule should be: Major candidates: five polls until the debates start, then participants afterwards. Minor candidates, Notoriety (Andy Martin and Jeff Boss have made themselves nationally obnoxious), and then, when the time comes, ballot access. After that, the numbers will take care of themselves.155.229.209.58 (talk) 16:15, 12 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Interesting suggestions, but consensus does not consist of one person's opinions. Before making your edits you need to either wait and see that multiple editors agree with you, or wait a few days and see that no one has disagreed with you. Ratemonth (talk) 16:26, 12 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Consensus was decided four years ago. Go to the 2012 Republican Candidates and primary results pages for further information. You will notice that ALL candidates on any ballot were listed. In order to be properly encyclopedic, one must be complete on topics like this one. Uniformity with other articles on this approximate topic is fully necessary.204.147.202.113 (talk) 17:58, 12 December 2015 (UTC)
 * I added all the candidates to that page fairly recently (within the past two years I believe). Those candidates were not listed during the election.  Only the notable candidates during the election were listed as is consensus.  I agree that the ballot-listed candidates should be included here.  I actually believe every candidate should be added to this page.  However, I do not agree with imposing this via edit warring against current consensus and that is why I backed Ratemonth's revert. --William S. Saturn (talk) 19:17, 12 December 2015 (UTC)
 * I don't think it's one editor, from the history it looks like four or five (I could be wrong). So how about if nobody strongly objects (state your reasons) by Monday at Noon EST?63.92.230.217 (talk) 20:15, 12 December 2015 (UTC)
 * It's 5:30 PM EST and no one has objected. I think this counts as consensus. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.107.133.97 (talk) 22:33, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

Ordering the Minors
All the previous elections articles have the candidates listed as per vote totals:


 * George Washington 123
 * Abe Lincoln      110
 * Dick Nixon        86

But for the entirety of 2015, it was alphabetical. This was to be non-partisan and fair. Which was fine for the time. But, at least for the minors, that time is over. For you see, ballot access IS vote totals. Getting on the ballot in ten states, like de la Fuente, or six like Willie Wilson means that they're going to get far more votes than someone who's on merely one or two. This is because there are three major candidates on all the ballots, and thus someone like Jim Rogers (who got 15 thousand as a favorite son), or John Wolf (who got well over a hundred thousand votes in the Democratic primary) won't have the "none of the above" glamour that would attract angry voters.

Using ballot access as a criterion for listing isn't POV or Crystal Ball. It's real numbers. 66.108.159.118 (talk) 22:16, 2 January 2016 (UTC)

George Noory
I removed George Noory from the "Publicly expressed interest" category because it has been three months since the article in which he expressed interest. I didn't add him to the "Previous" section, however, because he didn't seem to have multiple media sources speculating about his candidacy. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 02:42, 6 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Should candidates who publicly expressed interest be subject to the three month standard or two source rule as are speculated candidates? I don't think so. For example, in this case, it is verified that Noory expressed interest in the nomination.  Therefore, it is in error not to include him with those who also publicly expressed interest.  Unlike mere media speculation, publicly expressing interest is an affirmation.  It is done and cannot expire.--William S. Saturn (talk) 07:38, 6 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Well, it has to expire sometime. Noory has already missed the filing deadlines for multiple states' primaries. Suppose Noory makes no further comment about getting into the race. How long are we going to keep him in the "publicly expressed interest" category? After one of the candidates secures a majority of pledged delegates? After the last primary in June? Until the Democratic convention? If Noory wants to stay in the conversation as a potential Democratic candidate, then he can re-affirm that he is still interested and get a reliable media source to note that. But if he just fades out of the race without taking further action, then I would say at best he belongs in the "Previous" category. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 02:44, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
 * He should stay in the category forever. IMO "Publicly expressed interest" should be supplemented with ", but decided not to run." --William S. Saturn (talk) 08:03, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

Additional edits
I made the following edits:


 * 1) In the description of the major candidates, I added the words "most or" so that the sentence now reads, "The following candidates have been listed in five or more major independent nationwide polls, participated in all televised debates and forums, and are on the ballot in most or all states that have them finalized." (Emphasis added here.) That's because Martin O'Malley is a major candidate yet missed the ballot in Ohio.
 * 2) I added a "Vote total" column for the major candidates.
 * 3) I removed Iowa from Rocky De La Fuente's "Ballot status" column because I don't think that the Iowa Democratic caucus even uses a printed ballot. The caucusgoers form into preference groups by grouping themselves in different parts of the room for each candidate, not by marking a ballot. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 20:25, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

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