Epstein Files? - The Democrats Left Texas We are At War!

A condensed overview of 15 hours of Fox News for the week ending 8/10/25

Aug 13, 2025

Fox News, the unofficial propaganda network for the Trump administration, continued to largely ignore the Epstein files, a trove of documents that might link the president to a child sex trafficking ring.

Last week the network put most of its focus on a gerrymandering battle that involved Democratic Texas state representatives, the Trump administration, Texas Governor Greg Abbott along with the governors of Illinois, New York and California.

Jesse Watters presented the legislative fight as a war between good and evil for the soul of America. Although he over hyped the drama at least it was an important news story unlike the network’s other distractions from the Epstein files.

Fox News remained obsessed with Sydney Sweeney’s American Eagle jeans ad. Sweeney’s name appeared 58 times in last week’s transcripts. “Jesse Watters Primetime” included a man-on-the-street segment about the commercial that resulted in mostly tepid responses from random New Yorkers.

The network also focused on former President Joe Biden’s brief trip to an ice cream parlor. Jesse Watters mentioned it on his primetime show and “The Five” dedicated a six and a half minute segment to the president’s short excursion.

I’m not sure how surveillance camera footage of an elderly man with a couple of Secret Service agents in an ice cream shop was relevant to most Americans but Fox News included it throughout both segments.

One of the biggest stories of the week, Trump’s decision to fire the commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), was downplayed and buried by the network.

The BLS collects and analyzes labor market activity, data on wages, benefits, employer costs for compensation, working hours, workplace injuries and illnesses, and workplace fatalities. It includes the Consumer Price Index (CPI), which measures changes in the prices paid by urban consumers for goods and services, as well as the Producer Price Index (PPI), which tracks the average prices American producers receive for their goods and services.

Trump’s decision to fire the head of an agency as important as the BLS could be the beginning of the end of the U.S. economy’s dominance of global markets. It could even end up hurting Rupert Murdoch’s bottom line.

Anyone exclusively watch Fox News last week would most likely be completely unaware of the growing humanitarian and hunger crisis in Gaza. The network hasn’t included much about the conflict for weeks.

Shows I covered on Fox Last Week:

Fox & Friends
The Five
Jesse Watters Primetime

It’s War with the Democratic Party!

Last week Democratic Texas state representatives left their state to prevent a vote that would wipe out as many as five congressional districts currently held by Democrats. President Trump ordered the state’s Republican governor to create more Republican districts to help the party to keep control of the House of Representatives in the 2026 midterm elections.

Normally redistricting is done after every census, which is every ten years. Trump’s push for more seats cuts this timeframe in half.

The process of manipulating the boundaries of congressional districts to favor a political party is known as gerrymandering. Both parties are guilty of it but according to the Brennan Center for Justice gerrymandering has given Republicans a greater advantage in the House of Representatives.

“This decade, as last, Republicans disproportionately controlled the redistricting process, drawing 191 (or 44 percent) of the districts that will be used in this year’s (2024) elections. By contrast, Democrats fully controlled the drawing of only 75 districts. The rest were drawn by commissions, courts, or divided governments,” said Michael Li of the Brennan Center.

Each state has its own set of rules when it comes to drawing congressional maps which makes the process even more difficult to combat on a national level.

Lawmakers in Texas need at least two-thirds of the entire legislature present in order to pass any new bills so many of them fled to Illinois where they were welcomed and supported by Gov. J.B. Pritzker.

Abbott threatened the rogue Democratic lawmakers with daily fines and even apprehension by FBI agents if they didn’t return to Texas before the special session ended.

The ultimate outcome of the redistricting battle is still unknown. If Texas succeeds in wiping out Democratic districts Pritzker, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul and California Gov. Gavin Newsom have vowed to retaliate with their own gerrymandering.

Jesse Watters treated the fight as a battle for the soul of a nation. On Thursday he went on an extended rant about the Democratic Party.

“The Democrat Party has waged unrelenting political warfare for three decades. The president's been shot, spied on, arrested, impeached twice. We've been de-banked, censured Republicans. Homes have been raided. Republicans have been shackled, investigated, abused. The country was invaded. Our tax dollars are being stolen by their nonprofits. Their schools are indoctrinating our children. They're conducting sick operations on them. They've corrupted athletics, staged coups, been caught, ballot harvesting . . . It's been a bloodthirsty battle for power. And we haven't even been fighting until now. Finally, Trump's fighting back. And this time, he's not fighting for his own political survival. The Democrat Party is. They just lost seven swing states. Donors lost over a billion bucks. They're struggling to defend the biggest cover up in U.S. history and the party's broke and the least popular it's ever been. Every Republican state should look at the battle lines and do what's right. It's unacceptable to count illegals in a census that gives Democrats back the House. Do you want to give them back the House based off funky numbers, so they can have an impeachment hat trick and slow down deportations and keep sending millions of dollars to Guatemala for sex changes and hold hearings on DEI. Nancy Pelosi says if she gets back in power, she wants to start cutting off your kids’ ding-a-lings again . . . There's too much at stake. We have to lock in voter ID, we have to gerrymander the Reds, kicked the migrants out of the country, end the census and get to the bottom of the Biden coverup, and finally get accountability for the scoundrels who criminalized America First,” said Watters.

Jesse Watters Makes an Advertisement for ICE

During the same episode Watters appeared to do a brief commercial for ICE agents. As a graphic for the agency took up half the screen Watters looked earnestly into the camera and gave his pitch.

“If you believe in America first, join ICE. You get a $50,000 bonus and you get to jump out of a van and tackle illegals with Superman.”

Biden Bought Some Ice Cream

On Monday on “Jesse Watters Primetime,” Watters included a short segment about Biden’s trip to a Baskin-Robbins.

“And the big guy's got a lot of time on his hands to get revenge. He spent last week wandering around a Baskin-Robbins, drinking a milkshake with a straw,” said Watters.

Later that week producers on “The Five” got desperate enough to include the same brief footage of Biden in the ice cream shop to stretch it into a full segment on “The Five.”

“Maybe soft serve. Right? Candy. He likes his soft serve. Sprinkles or no sprinkles? I'm not really sure,” said Rosanna Scotto, a Fox 5 news anchor filling in for Judge Jeanine.

Jesse Watters included his odd rules for men.

“When you get an ice cream cone as a grown man, you go with your family. You go on vacation, you don't wander into an ice cream parlor by yourself. Security on a Tuesday afternoon. That's where it gets a little sad and pathetic.,” said Watters.

Scotto thought it was a scandal that Biden might purchase ice cream for his donors and other supporters.

“He spent about $10,000 on ice cream during the 2020 election, there are reports about that rule and that there are reports that he's been sent that. But he didn't eat all the, you know, all of it himself.”

Retired wrestler, Tyrus, sitting in for Greg Gutfeld added some international intrigue.

“No, no, no, nothing like using your illegal Chinese money to buy ice cream for the donors. They're taking him to the ice cream shop because he won't say, hey, where's my podium? Chocolate chip. And then he has a nice day, and then they go to the ice cream show again the following week. Then eventually they're going to go to the ice cream shop, and on the way back, they're going to stop at this really pretty hospital. I'm just going to have some ice cream in this little room. And then Doctor Jill's going to go talk to the doctor for a minute, and the door is going to lock.”

PBS - QAnon, Trump and The Epstein Files

On Tuesday William Brangham of the PBS News Hour spoke with Will Sommer, a journalist for The Bulwark, and author of “Trust the Plan: The Rise of QAnon and the Conspiracy That Unhinged America.”

Sommer gave a brief background on QAnon and its relationship to Trump.

“QAnon started in October 2017 with these anonymous posts on an internet message board from a figure calling themselves Q, and they said that the world was run by a cabal of pedophiles and the Democratic Party and Hollywood and banking, and that Donald Trump would someday send all those people to Guantanamo Bay and sort of reign as a sort of a dictator in a utopia. And so this QAnon believers sort of teamed up with Q and started reading through all the clues. And that's the origins of QAnon. But it was really on the fringe until 2019, 2020, when things like Jeffrey Epstein's death and the pandemic really drove a lot more people into conspiracy theories. And a lot of that, too, was where Donald Trump and his allies embracing conspiracy theories. Trump spoke very positively about QAnon believers during the 2020 campaign. So it's been a very symbiotic relationship between Trump and QAnon.”

PBS - The Frankenstein Monster That is The Epstein Files

During the interview Brangham referred to Trump’s embrace of conspiracy theories surrounding Jeffrey Epstein as Frankestein’s monster - a demon of sorts that once created by its master can no longer be controlled.

Sommer broke down the specific players in Trump’s cabinet who have found themselves in a tricky position. They are now expected to resolve the conspiracies they once promoted.

“Trump and people like Kash Patel, Dan Bongino and the FBI, J.D. Vance, all these people raise the profile of the idea of the client list, and they said, this is a really important thing, and we'll release it, will consider releasing it. Pam Bondi said the client list was on her desk after taking office. And then suddenly Trump says, whoa, whoa, whoa, like, what are you talking about? Who cares about that? And then he he goes on to even insult his supporters for being interested in it. And so it's a very strange turnabout that I think it's been really challenging for people like QAnon believers.”

PBS - Epstein Files

Brangham: Will you study conspiracies. Where do you come down on the Epstein case? Are there still unresolved questions?

Sommer: I think there's a lot that still needs to be answered about Epstein. I mean, even in sort of the most sober, you know, a versus speculation mode I can be in. I think it is it was just just some reporting suggesting that the video, the Justice Department released of Epstein's jail, didn't really prove that no one went up to his room the night he died. It's kind of a useless video. It's unclear why the Justice Department rushed it out and now won't answer questions about it. You know, Epstein got a very a sweetheart deal in the George W Bush administration, sort of, inexplicably, that protected him from a lot of criminal prosecution. Why was that? I think these are pretty basic questions, that reporters and other experts who have looked at the case have wondered about. And so I think there are there are a lot of legitimate questions that remain to be answered. It's interesting that the Trump administration seems to want to close the door so abruptly.

Trump Fired the Head of Bureau of Labor Statistics

The day the latest jobs report showed disappointing numbers President Trump promptly fired the commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics - economist Erika McEntarfer. The president claimed the numbers were ‘rigged’ even though he had absolutely nothing to back up his accusation.

Trump also falsely claimed that McEntarfer inflated the jobs numbers right before the last presidential election only to correct them after the fact. The major seasonal revision to the labor force numbers Trump was referring to was done in August - roughly three and a half months before the election.

Revisions and corrections are part of process of evaluating the labor market in the U.S. economy. The same agency revised job numbers down during Trump’s first administration.

Fox News and PBS handled this story very differently.

Fox News - The Jobs Numbers Have to be a Conspiracy!

On Monday, on “Fox & Friends” Lawrence Jones suggested the low numbers might be part of a nefarious plot against the president.

“Part of the allegation, not just from the administration, but many people in the president's camp. Is that because the president is so popular that government bureaucrats are doing anything they can to cut the numbers, to go against the president? And it's not just, you know, Republicans that are saying that he's the most popular president. You got CNN said that he is the most influential president of this century,” said Jones.

Jones was referring to a comment Harry Enten of CNN made during a segment on polling. Enten said,

“I can't think of a more influential president during this century.”

Influential does not have the same meaning as popular.

The definition of influential according to Merriam-Webster - exerting or possessing influence. Saying Trump is influential just means Trump is changing and shaping the American economy and political landscape.

The definition of the word popular - generally means well liked. In most recent polling, including the latest Fox News poll, a majority of Americans were unhappy with Trump’s job performance.

Jones was also making a lot of assumptions without any evidence to support his claim that bureaucrats were secretly working against Trump.

PBS Invited Trump’s Last Commissioner of BLS

Later that night PBS co-anchor Geoff Bennett interviewed William Beach, the commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics during Trump’s first term about the president’s decision to fire McEntarfer.

Bennett: So, President Trump called the July numbers fake. He accused Erica McEntarfer for the BLS commissioner he fired of rigging the data. What's your reaction to her firing and the underlying allegation?

Beach: Well, it's just it's just very implausible. And I'll tell you why. The commissioner of Labor Statistics, that was my job, has no access to the collection of the data, has no access to the summer summation of the data when it comes out of the regions, goes to the national office has no access, no hand, no possibility of having any involvement in the calculation of the numbers that are ultimately published. In fact, the commissioner doesn't see the number for the first time. The numbers are revealed to the commissioner Wednesday morning, usually around 11:00, in a meeting. Those numbers have now been loaded into all the machines all over the data center, which will go all over the world eventually until at 8:30 eastern time Friday morning. So, the claim that the commissioner could influence the data, has to be a lot more specific because there's no access to actually influence the data. Could the commissioner then put pressure on people to bend the data in one way or another. And I want to tell you, that's even more impossible. Knowing the hard headed and loyal Americans who work at the Bureau of Labor Statistics, who would never yield to pressure, whose whole life is devoted to having nonpolitical numbers come out of there. So, I think President Trump just got some bad advice.

When governments meddle in their own economic data it hasn’t ended well. Ben Casselman, chief economics correspondent at The New York Times, explained a few past examples of governments who tried to fake their prosperity.

The government of Greece tried to fake its deficit numbers for years only to end up with a debt crisis that required bail outs along with punishing austerity measures. Unemployment rose, the Greek economy shrank and poverty increased as the country tried to keep up with its debt payments.

In Argentina the government tried to understate its inflation numbers. Investors lost faith in the data which contributed to soaring borrowing costs. The country experienced a debt crisis and ended up defaulting on international loan obligations.

The U.S. already has an enormous national debt. Our economy is not a real estate deal that can be bluffed for short-term immediate gain.

If the United States defaults on U.S. treasuries it would damage the entire global economy. Trump is playing a very dangerous game by trying to force his delusions on the largest free market economy in the world.

Jessica Tarlov - Trump’s Legacy

On Monday Jessica Tarlov, the liberal voice on “The Five” shared her insight on Trump’s legacy and influence.

“I would argue that Trump's most lasting impact, or his biggest influence, has been on American's ability to actually know what is true and what is honest. And that starts with the big lie of 2020, with nearly 6 in 10 Republicans,” said Tarlov.

Her co-host Joey Johnny Jones interrupted her. She soldiered on.

“Nearly 60% of Republicans think that Joe Biden wasn't legitimately elected to be president. Donald Trump is actually in the midst of what would be a third term if when you got a Bureau of Labor report, which was all well and good two months ago when you did like the number, and then you fire that person. That's authoritarian stuff, and that tells people that you can't trust the numbers. You can't trust anyone who works in government. He threatens news outlets for coverage. He doesn't like what CBS just has to do. The assault on academic freedom, on law firms who represent people that he doesn't like, and then just the straight up lying about what is in the legislation with the reconciliation bill and the millions that will lose their Medicaid coverage . . . millions are going to lose their health insurance because of that bill. And Donald Trump looks you in the eye through the camera. And he says it's not true. The war on truth is his lasting legacy,” said Tarlov.

Stories Fox News Ignored

Every week I compare the hours I’ve watched on Fox News to five hours of the PBS News Hour. The following list are stories that PBS covered that Fox News did not. Source - PBS News Hour transcripts. This list has been slightly truncated due to space.

Updates in the Israel-Hamas War
- On Monday according to Gaza health officials 10 people died near aid sites belonging to the U.S.-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, according to medics on the ground. Five more people died from starvation or malnutrition bringing the total number of hunger-related deaths in Gaza to 180 since the war started. (PBS News Hour)
- Also on Monday in Jerusalem, dozens of Israelis protested outside the office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The Israeli leader faces mounting pressure to end the war and secure the return of the remaining hostages as part of a cease-fire deal. (PBS News Hour)
- Netanyahu also faced more blowback for his Cabinet's unanimous decision to fire the country's attorney general, claiming she exceeded her power. That attorney general had been prosecuting Netanyahu for corruption. Israel's Supreme Court immediately froze the move and is considering its legality. (PBS News Hour)
- On Tuesday Gaza health officials say Israeli strikes in Central and Southern Gaza killed at least 45 people, including dozens who were seeking aid. All told, authorities say the death toll has surpassed 61,000 since the October 7 Hamas terror attacks on Israel that started the war. (PBS News Hour)
- The president of neighboring Egypt is calling for an end to the conflict. Criticism is also coming from former top Israeli officials. In a video posted to social media, the previous heads of the internal security service, spy agency and military all criticized what they say is the government's prolonging of the conflict, with one calling Netanyahu's war objectives a "fantasy." (PBS News Hour)
- Hamas released a haunting video of 24-year-old Evyatar David, an Israeli hostage abducted from the Nova Music Festival during the Oct. 7 attacks. David's family is pleading for urgent international intervention. Geoff Bennett discussed more with Matan Eshet, a cousin of Evyatar David. Fox News briefly mentioned the video of David. In my analysis since the war started PBS News Hour has consistently given more time, attention and focus to families of the hostages than Fox News has. (PBS News Hour)
- On Wednesday, in Gaza, local health officials said at least 38 people were killed while trying to get aid. Beyond that, hospitals in Gaza reported an additional 25 deaths from Israeli airstrikes. (PBS News Hour)
- On Thursday health officials in Gaza said at least 42 Palestinians were killed in airstrikes and shootings. More aid was airdropped over North Gaza, sending desperate people scrambling. The World Health Organization said more Palestinians are dying due to hunger and that there are some 12,000 children under the age of 5 who are suffering from acute malnutrition. Fox News changed course from the previous week. The folks at “Fox & Friends” conceded that there was a hunger crisis in Gaza. This might be due to President Trump’s recent statements about hunger in Gaza. (PBS News Hour)
Climate disasters
- In Southern France, a wildfire that started Tuesday has claimed one life and injured more than a dozen others, including firefighters. The country's prime minister visited the scene, calling it an unprecedented disaster and saying that climate change is to blame. That fire in Southern France has now burned an area larger than the entire city of Paris. (PBS News Hour)
- In China, state media is reporting that floods have killed at least 10 people, with another 33 missing. Heavy rains triggered the flooding and landslides in the mountains of China's northwestern Lanzhou Province. President Xi Jinping has urged an all-out rescue operation to find those who are missing and evacuate those still left in the affected villages. The storms dropped nearly eight inches of rain in some areas, knocking out power and stranding more than 4,000 people. (PBS News Hour)
Over 3,000 Boeing workers who build fighter jets and weapons went on strike last Monday. It's the second strike for the aerospace giant in less than a year. The workers from three Midwestern plants rejected Boeing's latest contract offer of a 20% wage increase over four years. Boeing's defense branch accounts for more than a third of the company's revenue. (PBS News Hour)
The Gates Foundation has announced a new $2.5 billion pledge through 2030 for women’s health initiatives worldwide. It comes at a time when the Trump administration is cutting major research and aid directed at women and maternal health. (PBS News Hour)
In Florida, a federal judge ordered a temporary halt to construction at the so-called Alligator Alcatraz facility. The order bars workers from developing any new infrastructure at the site for two weeks while attorneys argue whether its construction violates environmental laws. The order will not affect operations at the facility where hundreds of detainees are currently being held. (PBS News Hour)
President Trump's big budget law is expected to make the largest cuts ever to Medicaid, a program that currently provides health insurance for some 70 million Americans. PBS visited Louisiana, which has one of the highest rates of enrollment in the country to talk to patients, doctors and healthcare professionals about what the cuts might mean for their community. (PBS News Hour)
President Trump is removing IRS Commissioner Billy Long after less than two months on the job. The former congressman was confirmed by the Senate in June, despite having no experience in tax administration. During his time in Congress, the former auctioneer and staunch Trump ally had sponsored legislation aimed at getting rid of the agency. No reason has been given for his removal. The IRS has now had six different people in charge this year. (PBS News Hour)
Actress Kelley Mack has died. She was best known for her role as Addy on the acclaimed zombie horror series "The Walking Dead." She also landed parts on hit dramas like "Chicago Med" and "9-1-1," among others. In January, she posted on social media that she had been diagnosed with a rare form of cancer. Kelley Mack was just 33 years old. (PBS News Hour)
The trailblazing pianist, composer and band leader Eddie Palmieri has died. Starting with his band La Perfecta in 1961, Palmieri was known for his innovative style, often mixing salsa with funk, soul and jazz sounds. In so doing, he left a lasting impression on Latin music worldwide. In 1975, Palmieri became the first Latino to win a Grammy Award for "The Sun of Latin Music." He would go on to win seven more over the course of his long career. Palmieri kept performing well into his 80s. His family says he died yesterday at his home in New Jersey after a long illness. Eddie Palmieri was 88 years old. (PBS News Hour)