Chris Christie is BACK, Rand Paul saves his spot with the big kids and Trump will take center stage at CNN debate

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul are surely breathing sighs of relief as both candidates will be on the prime time stage of CNN's Republican Las Vegas debate Tuesday night. 

The network announced the lineups of the main stage and undercard debate this afternoon, for the fifth Republican primary debate, with nine candidates participating in the former and four candidates participating in the latter. 

On the main stage will be GOP frontrunner Donald Trump, flanked by Ben Carson and Ted Cruz, followed by Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush, then going outward, Carly Fiorina and Chris Christie, and finally John Kasich and Rand Paul at the ends.

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Center stage:  All eyes will be on Trump after his controversial comments about Muslims last week and the billionaire will once again be front and center 

Chris Christie was buoyed by good numbers in New Hampshire back onto the main stage after having to sit at the kids' table at the Fox Business debate last month 

Chris Christie and Rand Paul have the most to cheer about with the debate news as Christie was forced to participate in the undercard debate last month due to low poll numbers and Paul was on the cusp this time

This is a comeback kid moment for Christie, who was pushed off the main debate stage the last time around, along with former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee.

Huckabee is still playing with the junior varsity team, which consists of Rick Santorum, George Pataki and Lindsey Graham as well. 

Graham and Pataki had been cut from the undercard Fox Business Debate in November, but will return back to the stage, taking the place of Christie and Bobby Jindal, who has dropped out of the race. 

CNN's rules were that any candidate who earned at least 3.5 percent on average in a set of national surveys taken from Oct. 29 to Dec. 13 would qualify. 

Additionally, candidates carrying 4 percent of the vote in either Iowa or New Hampshire would be in too, with the latter giving Christie a boost, along with Fiorina and Kasich, who are also doing well in the state. 

CNN was the first debate host to consider early state polls as the price of admission for a debate, with the previous four debate lineups being decided solely on national polls. 

This rule aided Christie, who has been third place in New Hampshire in recent polls, following frontrunner Trump and Rubio.  

To participate in the undercard debate, candidates had to have been getting one percent of the vote in four separate polls in either of the two early states or in national surveys. 

A Fox News poll that came out today rescued Paul from being pushed to the undercard debate. 

The poll, which surveyed Iowa voters, had Cruz ahead of Trump, which has been a trend in recent surveys. 

While Cruz was 10 points ahead of Trump in a Des Moines Register/Bloomberg poll, the Fox News poll only had the Texas senator leading by two points, with Cruz garnering 28 percent of support to Trump's 26 percent. 

Rubio was in third with 13 percent support, followed by the former Iowa frontrunner Carson at 10 percent. 

Bush is now at 5 percent, and so is Paul, which is how he was able to stay on the debate stage CNN said.

Politico did the math and suggested that Paul was still slightly short of the 4 percent average in Iowa needed, averaging just 3.7 percent, but Paul's campaign had been pressing the cable network, suggesting rounding should apply.

And the lobbying worked. 

'In the light of new polling released this morning and in the spirit of being as inclusive as possible, CNN has decided to include Sen. Rand Paul in the prime time debate,' a CNN spokesperson told Politico.