Getty Walker camp complains: 'CNN had an agenda last night'

Scott Walker's campaign is furious with what they say is CNN's agenda-driven coverage of the Wisconsin governor.

After asking Walker just three questions on Wednesday night’s debate, the network left the Wisconsin governor off a graphic that included all the other candidates Thursday.


Walker got the least amount of talk-time of the 11 candidates at the primetime debate (he actually ranked lowest out of the two debates combined) — just eight minutes and 29 seconds, according to NPR's count (POLITICO had him second to last, just ahead of Mike Huckabee). Donald Trump, in contrast, spoke for 18 minutes and 47 seconds.

After the debate, Walker complained that he could barely get a word in edgewise, though he managed to interject five times. “Short of tackling someone I don’t know what more I could have done,” he said. “I aggressively interrupted Jake Tapper a bunch of times along the way, and short of an absolute brawl I don’t know what more one can do. We jumped in, and for us its quality and not quantity.”

But the "quality" didn't draw much coverage, either: CNN's website played up the fireworks between Trump and Carly Fiorina and produced a highlight reel of the clashes between Trump and Jeb Bush.

The Walker camp was not happy: Press Secretary AshLee Strong retweeted Phil Kerpen, a free market policy analyst and syndicated columnist, who tweeted a picture of the errant graphic and wrote, “Wow, after stiffing @ScottWalker, @CNN leaves him off their chart like he wasn't even there."

"Gov. Walker had a lot to say last night, you could tell by the way he interjected to get his Wisconsin record and his plans into the debate. Unfortunately CNN had an agenda last night and it showed," said Kirsten Kukowski, Walker's communications director.

His campaign nonetheless released a series of statements praising his performance as leading the debate conversation.

“He delivered a flawless performance, winning the debate by aggressively outlining his plans to wreak havoc on the status quo in Washington and reminding people of his unmatched record of leadership and achievement in Wisconsin,” Campaign Manager Rick Wiley said in a statement Thursday night. “He put Donald Trump in his place early on, and the billionaire never recovered.”