Round two of the Republican Presidential Debate is just around the corner. And guess what? The field of competitors on both sides has changed—with one exception.

Donald Trump remains in the distant lead.

So here’s the big question: is 2016 going to be truly historic because of who voters are actually rejecting?

This is a Reality Check you won’t see anywhere else.

“Ben Carson, he’s a very nice man,” Trump said. “He’s surging but he’s way behind me. I’m saying, well, what about me? I’m leading? They don’t mention that.”

We’ll mention it. Trump continues to lead in every national and statewide poll.

Only two days away from the second Republican debate and the only other Republican candidate who doesn’t seem to have a campaign on life support is Dr. Ben Carson.

On ABC This Week, Carson said, “I recognize that I have plenty of energy you know operating on people for 10, 12 sometimes greater than 20 hours at a time making critical decisions.”

So here is how the top of the Republican race is shaping up: according to the latest Washington Post/ABC News poll, Trump leads the way at 33 percent, Carson is at 20 percent and the next highest candidate, Jeb Bush, has dropped to eight percent.

And how is Bush trying to revitalize his $140 million campaign?

“That’s the party I believe in, Reagan and Bush,” he said as he showed off a Reagan-Bush ’84 t-shirt. Yeah, 1984 might not the best year to connect your campaign to.

And then there is Bernie Sanders, who is now crushing Hillary Clinton in the first two primary and caucus states. Sanders, who has struggled to get any media coverage, now has a 10-point lead over Clinton in Iowa and a 20-point lead over Clinton in New Hampshire.

“The American people in my strong view are sick and tired of establishment politics of establishment economics,” Sanders said.

So what’s happening here?

The typical Washington pundit is going to say this shows that this is the year of the outsider. After all, we have a billionaire businessman and a neurosurgeon leading the GOP race, and a senator who is not even a Democrat but is an independent socialist leading the democratic side. But those pundits may not be recognizing what is really happening here.

Consider this: More than 7 in 10 Americans say people in politics cannot be trusted. More than 6 in 10 say the political system is dysfunctional. Sizable majorities of Democrats, Republicans and independents agree with those assessments.

So what you need to know is that this is not a push back against establishment candidates. What we are seeing here is a repudiation of America’s two-party system.

Why is it that Trump and Carson, who really aren’t strong “Republicans,” are doing so well?

Because voters are rejecting the Republican Party and what they believe it stands for.

Why is Sanders, who isn’t a Democrat, doing so well?

Because voters are rejecting the Democratic Party and what it stands for.

At the end of the day, more and more people believe that those two parties actually stand for the same thing: cronyism, greed and self-interest. What may make this election historic? Anyone who is not beholding to those parties seems to be the attractive candidate.

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