The Democratic National Committee will not host a presidential debate centered around climate change, presidential candidate and Washington Gov. Jay Inslee said Wednesday.

Inslee added that the DNC told him it would ban any candidates who participate in a climate debate from future DNC debates.

"This is deeply disappointing," Inslee said in a statement. "The climate crisis merits a full discussion of our plans, not a short exchange of talking points."

In an interview with CNN, he also pushed back against the DNC's decision to ban candidates who would like to participate in a climate change debate.

"That's outrageous to me, to muzzle candidates who want to go out and have this debate," he said.

The DNC defended itself in a statement, adding that climate change should have been "more prominent" during the 2016 presidential election.

Just five minutes and 27 seconds were dedicated to discussing climate change during the 2016 debates, one of the main reasons Inslee and several groups launched petitions for the DNC to host a climate change debate.

"While climate change is at the top of our list, the DNC will not be holding entire debates on a single issue area because we want to make sure voters have the ability to hear from candidates on dozens of issues of importance to American voters," the DNC said.

Inslee criticized the characterization of climate change as a "single issue area" in a tweet.

Fellow presidential hopeful Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts backed up Inslee, saying climate change is the "biggest challenge we face."

"Every candidate running for president should have a serious set of policies to address it, and should be eager to defend those proposal in a debate," Warren said in a tweet.