Jill Stein and Cheri Honkala sit outside the debate in Hempstead, Long Island. Green Party ticket arrested at debate

Green Party presidential nominee Dr. Jill Stein and her running mate, Cheri Honkala, were released from police custody Tuesday night, hours after authorities arrested them during their failed attempt at attending the second presidential debate at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y.

Stein and Honkala tried to enter the debate hall for about 20 minutes — at one point sitting down in the street outside of the university with an American flag on their laps — and a Nassau County officer warned them that they would be arrested for blocking traffic if they did not leave, according to the The Long Island Report.


They were released shortly following the debate, Dr. Stein told POLITICO. She said it wasn’t a planned publicity stunt.

“It wasn’t planned in advance. As of last night we agreed that we should go to the debate and try to get in. It was unfair to the American public to be locked out,” she said. “The voters deserve to hear who the candidates are, what the isues are and what their choices are in this election.”

The Green Party ticket will be on an estimated 85 percent of ballots this election, according to a campaign press release. The nonpartisan Commission on Presidential Debates stipulates that a candidate must garner at least 15 percent in national polls in order to participate.

Stein campaign manager Ben Manski told POLITICO that the candidates were taken into Nassau County Police custody at about 3 p.m. and will remain so until “at least” midnight.

Manski said that the two were not planning to heckle if they gained access to the debate, and instead were planning on speaking with reporters about the CPD’s “illegitimate standard” that candidates must have 15 percent polling requirement.

“If you put Jill Stein against [GOP presidential nominee] Mitt Romney or [President] Barack Obama head to head, she would be polling above 15 percent,” Manski said.

Earlier Tuesday, Stein called the presidential debate a “mockumentary.”

“We are here to bring the courage of those excluded from our politics to this mock debate, this mockery of democracy,” Stein said, according to the campaign release.

Police arrested Stein, Honkala and three other Green Party members during an Aug. 1 protest against Fannie Mae in Philadelphia.