University of Colorado students are frustrated that they won’t be able to attend the Republican presidential debate being held on their campus and are banding together this week to demand that more tickets be made available.

Late Thursday night, the CU Student Government passed a special resolution chiding the university, the Republican National Committee and CNBC, the cable news channel that’s broadcasting the debate, for making just 50 tickets available to the university community.

The Oct. 28 debate is being held at the Coors Events Center, which can seat more than 10,000 people. But the audience will be capped at roughly 1,000, with a small fraction of those seats going to university students, faculty and administrators.

When she heard those numbers, CU junior Bea Lacombe was surprised. Lacombe is a representative-at-large for CU Student Government and worked with her colleagues to let the debate organizers know how unhappy students are.

She said it’s frustrating that her generation is accused of political apathy, and yet can’t attend significant political events like the debate.

“It sends the wrong message to students,” Lacombe said.

Students took to Facebook this week to discuss email blitzes and potential protest actions on the day of the debate. They also started an online petition.

The CU Student Government resolution calls for a “drastic” increase in the number of tickets available to students and the community and states that if the Republican National Committee and CNBC refuse to do so, the university should no longer be involved with the event.

Television event

On Friday, CU officials said they shared the students’ concerns and announced that the Republican National Committee increased its allotment of tickets for CU to 100.

“We have requested more, but we anticipate that few, if any, will be forthcoming,” wrote CU-Boulder spokesman Ryan Huff in an email. “We understand that this is primarily a television event and CNBC has limited the audience of the 11,000-seat Coors Events Center to about one-tenth of capacity due to the set-up of the stage, lighting, camera equipment, etc.”

He said the university will soon be releasing information about a student watch party on campus.

Sean Spicer, chief spokesman for the Republican National Committee, reiterated on Friday that the debate is a televised event not meant for a live audience.

The small audience size is meant to limit the number of distractions to candidates and to the TV production process.

“This isn’t a play,” he said.

He said the debate being held at CU has one of the largest audiences in history. Cleveland’s 21,000-seat Quicken Loans Arena hosted an audience of about 4,500 for the first GOP debate in August, while the debate this month at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library hosted about 300 people.

Spicer added that student volunteers are being used by both the Republican committee and the TV network, which he believed would be a more meaningful experience for students than watching the debate live.

“Instead of being a potted plant watching a debate for an hour or two, I know CNBC and the RNC are using students and they’ll actually be an active part of this, which frankly I think is a much more exciting thing,” he said.

Funding to be determined

University officials say they are not charging CNBC or the Republican National Committee for the use of Coors Events Center but expect to reap huge publicity benefits from the exposure.

Huff, the university spokesman, said Friday that CU is also providing police, security and other expenses at no cost, which he said is standard for hosting a debate.

Huff added that no tuition revenue or student fee funds are being used for the event, as Chancellor Phil DiStefano plans to use private fundraising dollars and campus insurance premium rebates to pay for the debate costs.

“We are doing this because we are cognizant of the national and international media attention and branding value this event will bring to the university,” he said. “More than 20 million people around the world watched each of the previous two debates.”

‘Entertainment and media spectacle’

Even so, CU senior Julian Taranow took issue with CU spending any money for an event that students and employees can’t attend. He said he also feels CU misled students and community members when it first announced the debate.

He pointed to a university news release that quoted Chancellor Phil DiStefano as saying the event would be a “memorable experience for our students and entire community.”

Other university leaders spoke about wanting to give students a chance to hear diverse political perspectives.

“This event should be an opportunity to provide a unique experience that students cannot find elsewhere,” Taranow said.

Another senior Eliot Kersgaard said he doesn’t know why debate organizers chose to hold the event on a college campus if most of the campus community isn’t able to attend.

He said this conflict seems representative of the commercialization of politics as a whole.

“The political process has turned into more of an entertainment and media spectacle than anything else,” he said.

Though many students insisted that there were no partisan motives behind their outcry, that didn’t stop the left-leaning group ProgressNow Colorado from making the audience size a political issue.

“What is the Republican National Committee so afraid of that they have to lock the CU student body out of this debate?” said Amy Runyon-Harms, the group’s executive director, in a news release.

“A hand-picked audience clapping politely at the Coors Events Center while Donald Trump insults women and Ben Carson insults Muslims would be an insult to the intelligence of every University of Colorado student. The millions of viewers watching this debate deserve to see and hear how real people respond to these presidential candidates. Anything less is worthless political theater, and a misuse of the University of Colorado’s reputation for open and accessible dialogue.”

Sarah Kuta: 303-473-1106, kutas@dailycamera.com or twitter.com/sarahkuta