Carly Fiorina, a former Hewlett-Packard chief executive with deep roots in California, will join 10 other Republican presidential hopefuls onstage at the Reagan Presidential Library next week.

Weak poll numbers kept Fiorina out of last month's first debate for top candidates, forcing her into a forum for lower-tier presidential hopefuls. The benefit: She trounced the other challengers, including former Texas Gov. Rick Perry and former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania.

Fiorina, the lone woman in the 2016 GOP primary, saw a boost in her poll numbers afterward. But she still could have been kept off next week's main debate stage because the rules set by CNN, which will air the debate, called for an average of polls from well before the first debate.

Ultimately, CNN amended its rules for inclusion into the debate.

How Fiorina does against stronger candidates, like billionaire businessman Donald Trump and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, will be telling.

Thursday marked the close of the two-month window for determining eligibility for CNN's debate based on averages of national polls. The results were based on 14 polls.

Here's a breakdown of the group:

1. Donald Trump: 23.9%

2. Jeb Bush: 11.5%

3. Scott Walker: 9.4%

4. Ben Carson: 8.9%

5. Ted Cruz: 6.2%

6. Marco Rubio: 5.6%

7. Mike Huckabee: 5.5%

8. Rand Paul: 4.7%

9. John Kasich: 3.2%

10. Chris Christie: 3.1%

11. Carly Fiorina: 2.2%

The Times' Michael A. Memoli has been following Vice President Joe Biden's movements as he contemplates a possible 2016 presidential run.

Biden appeared on "The Late Show" Thursday night.

Gov. Jerry Brown suffered a defeat on Wednesday night when environmental legislation was watered down in Sacramento, but on Thursday he was back to needling Republican presidential candidates over climate change.

This time he singled out Ben Carson, the conservative neurosurgeon who has been campaigning in California.

During a San Francisco event, Carson said, “There is no overwhelming science that the things that are going on are man-caused and not naturally caused.”

So Brown is sending Carson a flash drive with a massive United Nations report on climate change.

“These aren't just words,” Brown wrote in a letter. “The consequences are real.”

He concluded, “Please use your considerable intelligence to review this material. Climate change is bigger than partisan politics.”

For the second time in just more than a month, Vice President Joe Biden is in New York, for another event today with Gov. Andrew Cuomo and an appearance on the new Stephen Colbert-hosted "Late Show." Next week, Biden will be in Southern California, also for the second time in a matter of weeks.

Biden's travel to the locales of two of his party's biggest donor bases is not entirely coincidental. He'll also be fundraising for Senate Democrats tonight, and it's at these types of events where he's heard questions about his potential presidential campaign plans , if not outright encouragement to jump in the race.

But, as the Times reported recently , his timeframe for a decision -- once expected in August, then September -- could slide further still. That's mainly by an unanswered question close to home: whether his family is ready for the grind of a campaign so soon after the loss of his eldest son, Beau, who died in May.

A new analysis by Elaine Kamarck and Ashley Gabriele of the Brookings Institution lays out the cost to Biden of waiting, as filing deadlines for nominating contests come and go, and with them the chance to amass delegates required to secure the Democratic nomination.

"A candidate who is not on a primary ballot can't win delegates from that state -- pure and simple," Kamarck and Gabriele write. "And so missing a filing deadline is akin to forfeiting delegates to the convention."

If Biden were to wait until after November to enter the race, for instance, he loses eligibility to contend for about 500 delegates. By the end of the year, the total climbs above 1,500. And by mid-January, it would be all but impossible for Biden to win enough delegates to amass the required 2,232 required to win the nomination.

"Late entrants can scramble to raise money and put together a staff, they can afford to miss debates; but no one can afford to miss filing deadlines," the analysts conclude.

Brookings' findings aren't news to Biden's team, which has worked for months -- even before the recent boomlet of speculation -- to prepare for contingencies so that when Biden would be prepared to turn his attention back to politics, he had a clear sense of what was required of him to mount a campaign. Biden's activities more recently show he's weighing those options more seriously . As for just how much? Well, maybe he'll tell Stephen Colbert tonight.

It didn't take long for Donald Trump's disparaging comments about Carly Fiorina to turn into a back-and-forth between the GOP rivals.

Shortly after the Rolling Stone article posted online quoting Trump mocking Fiorina's looks, the California Republican shot back Wednesday evening.

"Maybe I'm getting under his skin a little bit because I am climbing in the polls," Fiorina told Fox News' Megyn Kelly, another woman who has tangled with Trump.

In the magazine profile, Trump is quoted as saying, "'Look at that face! Would anyone vote for that?" while watching Fiorina on television.

In a round of TV interviews Thursday morning, Trump tried to soften the comment by saying they were "jocular."

"I'm talking about persona," he told host Chris Cuomo on CNN's "New Day," adding that he thinks the media unfairly pounces on his comments, while ignoring similar remarks from other candidates.

"And what she's saying about my hair, I know that's OK and you won't defend me."

Amid all the worry about alienating Latino voters in 2016, The Times' Kate Linthicum reminds us that Latinos are far from realizing their power in electoral politics.

Voter turnout still lags among the more than 25 million eligible Latino voters in the U.S., held back by a mix of political, cultural and historical influences. The key numbers:

"The U.S. electorate may be less reflective of the nation's ethnic and racial diversity today than it was in the 1950s, when the country was 90% white, according to political scientist Bernard Fraga of Indiana University, who studies minority voting trends.

"In the 2014 midterm election, only 27% of eligible Latinos voted, compared with 46% of whites and 41% of African Americans, according to U.S. census data."

A new Rolling Stone profile of Donald Trump is likely to revive questions about the GOP candidate's treatment of women.

In a piece posted online Wednesday, writer Paul Solotaroff describes watching Trump watch television and quotes the candidate's remarks when rival Republican Carly Fiorina comes on the screen:

"'Look at that face!' he cries. 'Would anyone vote for that? Can you imagine that, the face of our next president?!' The laughter grows halting and faint behind him. 'I mean, she's a woman, and I'm not s'posedta say bad things, but really, folks, come on. Are we serious?'"

Trump has faced steady scrutiny for his dismissive and sometimes derogatory comments about women. But the remarks don't appear to be making a dent in his support.

If his battle with Fox News host Megyn Kelly didn't leave a mark, this latest comment may merely rile up Fiorina fans. Or perhaps it's an opening to return to the discussion at the GOP debate next week.