Despite boycott threat, Tulsi Gabbard opts to attend next Democratic debate

Democratic presidential candidate Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (Hawaii) will participate in Tuesday's Democratic debate, despite her earlier threats to boycott the event.

In a short tweet sent Monday morning, the congresswoman and Iraq War veteran announced, "I will be attending the debate," with no further explanation.

Last week, Gabbard floated the idea of boycotting the debate, arguing that the Democratic Party was rigging the primaries by "using polling and other arbitrary methods which are not transparent or democratic" as a means to weed out candidates.

"The 2016 Democratic Primary election was rigged by the DNC and their partners in the corporate media against Bernie Sanders," Gabbard said in a statement. "In this 2020 election, the DNC and corporate media are rigging the election again, but this time against the American people in the early voting states of Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Nevada."

"In short," she concluded, "the DNC and corporate media are trying to hijack the entire election process."

Gabbard failed to qualify for the debate in September and has yet to qualify for the one in November, which requires candidates to get donations from 165,000 different donors and clear 3 percent support in four qualifying polls.

Tuesday's debate will take place at Otterbein University in Westerville, Ohio. It will feature the 10 candidates who attended the last debate plus Gabbard and pro-impeachment billionaire Tom Steyer. In order to make the cut for this one, candidates had to collect donations from 130,000 different people and clear 2 percent support in four approved polls.