Former President Donald Trump at a rally in Waco, Texas, on March 25, 2023. Photo / Christopher Lee, The New York Times
Former President Donald Trump at a rally in Waco, Texas, on March 25, 2023. Photo / Christopher Lee, The New York Times
ANALYSIS:
Reunions can be awkward.
Former President Donald Trump finally returned this week to his old stomping ground, Fox News, after several months away. The chilly reception from some of his one-time media allies underscored his uneasy place at the moment in Republican politics.
Yes, Sean Hannity, the Fox Newsanchor who conducted the interview, listened patiently as Trump reeled off his usual talking points about the “fake news media” and “horrible” Democrats. The former president said Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida, a potential rival for the Republican presidential nomination, would be toiling “at a pizza parlour” without his endorsement. And he concluded with the grim assessment that “our country is dead”.
But while Fox News and Trump existed for years in a kind of symbiosis — with on-air personalities effusively praising Trump and benefiting from big ratings for his frequent appearances — the network is no longer the all-encompassing Trump safe space it used to be.
Rupert Murdoch has used media properties like Fox News to promote DeSantis as a potential saviour of the Republican Party. Until this week, Trump had not appeared on a Fox News broadcast since declaring his candidacy in November. And minutes after Trump’s interview aired, network personalities were taking the former president to task.
Laura Ingraham, whose prime-time programme directly follows Hannity, was once so close to Trump that she attended his election night party in November 2020. On her Monday show, she allowed New York Post columnist Miranda Devine to criticise Trump for “complaining endlessly about the past” and “constantly dwelling on grievance”.
Sean Hannity speaks at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Dallas, August 4, 2022. Photo / Emil Lippe, The New York Times
When her other guest, Trump loyalist Stephen Miller, loudly interjected that the former president “has put forward a new policy plan every week”, Ingraham sounded sceptical of his argument.
“Why isn’t he talking about them?” she asked Miller.
The next morning, Jason Chaffetz, a former Republican congressperson turned Fox News contributor, denounced Trump’s performance as “absolutely horrific”.
“I voted for Donald Trump twice; I have defended him countless times. I thought he was horrific,” Chaffetz said. “I think that was the worst interview I’ve seen the president do.” He went on to criticise the former president for “whining”, “complaining” and playing “the victim card”. Steve Doocy and Brian Kilmeade, two of the co-hosts of the morning show Fox & Friends, also knocked Trump’s performance.
Nielsen ratings — one of Trump’s preferred metrics — provided their own kind of tough review. In past years, a Trump interview would almost always deliver Fox News’ biggest audience of the day. On Monday, Trump drew 3.04 million viewers, higher than the average episode of Hannity but well below that day’s viewership for The Five and Tucker Carlson Tonight.
With a defamation suit against Fox News filed by Dominion Voting Systems hurtling toward a trial, it was notable that Hannity’s interview with Trump was pretaped. Trump’s baseless claims about a “rigged” 2020 election are central to the Dominion case; a live appearance by Trump in which he repeats those claims could be hazardous for the network. It could also put a Fox News anchor in the awkward position of having to contradict Trump on-air, the kind of exchange that could easily go viral and turn off some of the network’s viewers.
DeSantis, meanwhile, continues to rely on Fox News and other Murdoch properties for his major media appearances, even as his absence from other conservative-friendly outlets like Breitbart News has come under new scrutiny.
Megyn Kelly, the former Fox News star who now hosts a successful podcast, revealed to listeners this week that DeSantis has been ducking her invitations.
“I love Piers Morgan, he’s a pal of mine, but why would you go sit with the British guy and not come on this show?” Kelly said on her programme, referring to DeSantis’ recent interview with the London-based Morgan.
“I will venture to say he’s afraid,” Kelly added. “I’m just going to put it out there: he’s afraid because he knows the kind of interview that I would give him. He’s not going to get a pass.”
The Florida governor avoids most one-on-one interactions with the mainstream media. Other than a recent appearance on Eric Bolling’s Newsmax programme, DeSantis has leaned extensively on venues controlled by Murdoch, even those based overseas. He gave an interview to The Times of London. Morgan is based at TalkTV, a British network owned by Murdoch, although his DeSantis interview aired on the streaming channel Fox Nation and was excerpted by The New York Post.
It has not been lost on Trump’s allies that DeSantis’ poll numbers have softened at a moment when he is enjoying mostly sympathetic coverage from Fox News.
And there are subtle signs that DeSantis may not always be able to bank on the network’s good graces. On Tuesday, Jesse Watters, a co-host of The Five, offered some advice to the Florida governor in the wake of Trump’s attacks.
“DeSantis is taking a bruising,” Watters said. “If I were Ron, I would start talking. Because every day that goes by, Trump draws blood.” He added, “How many more weeks and months is this going to sustain itself? Ron’s got to come out and say something, or else he’s just going to limp into this primary.”
