Fox News: Coverage of the New Hampshire Primary

A condensed breakdown of how Fox News covered the New Hampshire primary - full newsletter for paid subscribers. Partial newsletter for everyone.

On Tuesday Fox News reported from a hotel in New Hampshire to bring its viewers the results from the primary. It was a two-hour special broadcast at 10:00 p.m. EST which aired well after Trump was declared the winner.

The producers placed the same giant Fox News branded desk they used in Iowa in the middle of a large event space in the hotel. Throughout the evening different stalwarts from the network were trotted out and shared their opinions about the 2024 presidential primary election.

The entire endeavor was more like an extended cheering section for the candidacy of Donald J. Trump than it was a celebration of democracy. The network doesn’t even try to hide its bias.

Brit Hume was the stand out curmudgeon who surprisingly kept pointing out that if Trump truly was an incumbent of sorts he didn’t perform as well in Iowa or New Hampshire as he should have.

I’ve pulled some memorable quotes from the evening so no one reading this will have to subject themselves to the two-hour Trump love-fest. I also focused on the moments when a Fox News personality mentioned a weakness in the party or Trump’s 2024 presidential bid.

Fox News Coverage - New Hampshire - 10:00 p.m. EST

Moderators:

• Bret Baier - Fox News

• Martha MacCallum - Fox News

Duration - 1 hour and 23 minutes (minus commercial breaks)

Fox News Correspondents

• Alexis McAdams - Fox News (Trump HQ)

• Bryan llenas - Fox News (Haley HQ)

• Bill Hemmer - Fox News - election map

• Pete Hegseth - Fox News (NH Republican watch party)

• Sandra Smith - Fox News - Fox News Analysis Survey

• Madison Alworth - Fox News (Write-in Biden HQ)

• Peter Doocy - Fox News (outside the White House)

First Panel:

• Brit Hume - Fox News

• Shannon Bream - Fox News

• Dana Perino - Fox News

• Trey Gowdy - Fox News, former congressman

Martha MacCallum started the night off discussing Trump’s harsh words towards his Republican rival Nikki Haley. Calling Trump’s Iowa speech gracious seems a bit of a stretch.

“He called her an imposter. He said who the hell is this imposter about her speech that she gave . . .It was an interesting speech, given the rather gracious speech that we saw in Iowa. That is not what we saw tonight,” said MacCallum.

Trump was still insulting people like a junior high bully might. Bret Baier attempted to explain Trump’s actions.

“So the former president clearly came out and was not happy with the fact that Nikki Haley came out first well before the former president's speech and said essentially that she was moving on and fighting on,” said Baier.

Brit Hume seemed a bit over all of the hype. This was the first of many verbal stabs he made at the former president.

“If you think of him as an incumbent, this showing tonight is weak,” said Hume.

Second Panel:

• Sean Hannity - Fox News

The longest running host on Fox News got his own panel. Nothing he said was shocking or that interesting. He repeated the sentiment others had said before him - ‘if Nikki Haley loses South Carolina it would be a disaster for her.’

“If I'm Nikki Haley's campaign manager, what I strategize and what I think about, okay, do we really want to go into your home state and maybe lose by a significant margin? What would be the long term impact of that?” said Hannity.

Third Panel:

• Kellyanne Conway - Fox News, former counselor to the president (Trump)

• Charles Payne - Fox Business

• Jessica Tarlov - Fox News (liberal)

• Kayleigh McEnany - Fox News, former White House Press Secretary (Trump)

The topic of the long-shot candidacy of Democrat Dean Phillips came up. Most of the Fox hosts predicted he’d win over 20% of the vote that night. He didn’t. Phillips got 19.6%.

They also pretended he was a real threat to the Biden campaign. The only hold out was Jessica Tarlov, one of the regular liberal voices on “The Five.”

“There aren't Dean Phillips voters who say they won't vote for Joe Biden. And that's a difference from what we saw on the Republican side. Eighty-eight percent of Nikki Haley's voters said that they would be dissatisfied if Donald Trump was the nominee. It certainly looks like he's in complete cruise control heading towards that,” said Tarlov.

Kellyanne Conway offered the Trump campaign some advice.

“But when you look at the Republican Party, seven in ten Nikki Haley voters said they would not vote for Trump. There was a Des Moines Register poll, 43% said, no, I wouldn't vote for Trump. If I'm Trump. I sit back and I exclusively focus on the general election. I take the posture of a presumptive nominee. I focus on, number one, uniting the party and number two, winning the Independent, which Nikki Haley won 55 to 39%,” said Conway.

Charles Payne went on a bit of a tear about what he claimed was Biden’s hatred of MAGA voters.

“I don't think it's narcissism. I think it's we've lived in New York long enough. You know, it's maybe a New York thing. Someone punched you, you punch back harder. That's why I grew up in Harlem . . .He became president of United States with that same personality. I don't think you know, listen, I think it's worse for Biden calling MAGA Biden's anger and vitriol and hatred for MAGA. It's far more worse than President Trump's individual battles with someone who crosses him. That is something that is really detrimental to this country that the president of the United States despises half of the United States. President Biden, I said earlier today, I just about a week ago, I had a segment coming up. So I do Joe Biden hates MAGA.”

Conway was also defensive of her former boss with a new version of the ‘Trump derangement syndrome’ criticism.

“I've said many times on this network, and I'll say it again tonight, if people a lot of people spend a fraction of the time that they spent obsessing over Donald Trump, the person learning one thing about the Trump voter, things may be very different. This is Joe Biden's version of Hillary's deplorable and irredeemable,” said Conway.

Fourth Panel

• Ronna McDaniel - RNC Chairwoman

McDaniel got about five minutes to tow the party line. She pushed for Nikki Haley to drop out of the race.

“Look at the path and the math. And I think you have to reflect tonight if you're on the Haley campaign and say, if I'm not on the ballot in Nevada, if I'm not going to maybe win my home state. What's the most important thing going forward? And every has to agree that Joe Biden is a threat to our country,” said McDaniel.

Producers proudly featured the Fox News Voter Analysis Survey again with Sandra Smith going through the data next to a giant touch screen.

“The data really is interesting out of New Hampshire. The top issue once again is immigration for voters on the ground there.

In fact, I can tell you that this is a bigger issue in New Hampshire than it even was in Iowa. This number looked more like 41% on the ground in Iowa. So this is 42% of voters said this is a top issue for them. And of those voters, Donald Trump wins. I mean, this is this is a winning issue for him.

73% of those voters who said that was the top issue cast their ballot for Donald Trump when it came to the economy. The second biggest issue for voters in New Hampshire, 31% of them. Trump still wins on this issue for people concerned about their finances and about the future of their their families, economic health, but by a smaller margin over Nikki Haley.

You look at the other issues up here, foreign policy and abortion, they're in the single digits. So again, it's all about immigration, action and the economy, both winning issues for Donald Trump. Taking a look at fossil fuels, you heard the president, former president talk about it in his speech tonight. You've heard him say drill, baby, drill. And if he gets another term in office, this is what he would do,” said Smith.

Smith then made a pivot to questions about abortion.

“One other key finding I want to show you guys, obviously, and the views on abortion from voters in New Hampshire, of those voters who say that they want to see abortion legal most of the time, 54%. This is this is what we saw play out for the candidates,” said Smith.

There was no additional commentary on the fact that the survey showed a majority, 54%, of Republican voters in New Hampshire supported legalizing abortion.

“So, 54% put their support behind Nikki Haley, 40% for Donald Trump. If they wanted to see abortion illegal, at least some of the time. Look at that. Almost three quarters of that vote went to Donald Trump. So these are some of the big issues on the ground there. And clearly it shows that Donald Trump is running and campaigning on these winning issues.”

According to the data abortion was not a winning issue for Trump. If a majority of Republican voters want to keep abortion legal it really shouldn’t matter the minority of Republican voters who want to restrict abortion favor Donald J. Trump.

Fifth Panel

• Dana Perino

• Brit Hume

• Shannon Bream

• Trey Gowdy

Brit Hume continued to point out the many problems the Republicans are facing for 2024.

“I think you compare the results in the two parties. There's contained therein a kind of an ominous warning for the Republicans because look at the Democratic side, right? Joe Biden enfeebled, obviously senile, but guarded by even a significant number of people in his own party as not really up to the job. He gets this overwhelming victory. They all rallied behind him. Right. That is a party. And they write it on the ballot. Exactly. That write in. Right. I mean, it's kind of a half write in last minute deal. And and he and he prevails and does overwhelmingly. And and I say that that's a sign of a party that that understands power and knows how to hold on to it.

Meanwhile, the Republicans are divided. We've got you know, Trump is, as we've talked about, kind of an effective incumbent and it's seen that way. And yet he's got to fend off a challenge here. You know, he's getting the fifties mid-fifties that that's a big win tonight and called him and it may be but it's not the kind of thing you expect an incumbent to get.

So the divisions in the party are very clear and it's not clear that many that many of the voters who who supported Nikki Haley tonight, some of them brought in from the ranks of independents, would be prepared to support Trump in a general election. So there's real weakness there on the Republican side in terms of the divisions within the party, said Hume.

Trey Gowdy was directly critical of Trump’s petty insults and obsession with the past.

“Why talk about what dress someone is wearing and why talk about the 2020 election? Start talking about November,” said Gowdy.

Final Panel

• Katie Pavlich - Fox News

• Charlie Hurt - Washington Times

• Juan Williams - Fox News

• Marc Thiessen - Washington Post, former White House speechwriter, G.W. Bush

Marc Thiessen evoked Ronald Reagan.

“The way Ronald Reagan won the presidency was he won the Reagan Democrats and the Reagan Democrats were decisive in the Reagan Democrats became Republicans. And we are going to need the Haley Democrats if the Republicans are going to beat Joe Biden,” said Thiessen.

Baier noted that Trump has said he doesn’t think of himself as an incumbent. Juan Williams strongly disagreed.

“I think that's delusional. I mean, the fact is that he not only, you know, in the game of politics, it's money message, but it's also name I.D. You can't beat Donald Trump's name I.D. He dominates in terms of media. I think the big question now is Nikki Haley is going to push for debates and she's got ways. If you look at the polls, she's got a way. She's got messages that she says I can go after. Donald Trump successfully cost his lawsuits, his lame duck status, his age. I think that's what she's going to have to win a primary,” said Williams.

PBS NewsHour - New Hampshire - 11:00 p.m. EST

Moderators:

• Geoff Bennett - PBS NewsHour, co-anchor

• Amna Nawaz - PBS NewsHour, co-anchor

Duration - 25 minutes