Fox News: Trump Town Hall, the Last GOP Debate on Another Network and More Hunter Biden Madness
A condensed overview of 16 hours of Fox News for the week ending 12/10/23
Last week on Fox former President Donald J. Trump staged an impromptu ‘town hall’ that was really just a softball interview with a cheering section while a lesser-known cable news channel hosted the fourth Republican debate and Hunter Biden got indicted again.
Although Fox News didn’t host the last GOP debate, they did dedicate a surprising amount of airtime to it. The network also pivoted its focus from the Israel-Hamas war to segments about the U.S. House committee on antisemitism on college campuses.
The network didn’t feature much in terms of coverage of the Israel-Hamas war. Fox producers might have realized there are only so many ways to show airstrikes without featuring a single injured or killed Palestinian. Fox has shifted its focus from the war to segments about pro-Palestinian rallies, antisemitism, and various celebrities making problematic statements about the conflict.
Segments about the Israel-Hamas war didn’t even make the top five topics this week and only took up roughly 3% of the airtime in the programs I covered.
Fox neglected to inform its viewers about several stories that included court cases challenging abortion laws in Kentucky and Texas. The network also didn’t cover climate disasters in Africa or new data that showed 2023 was the hottest year on record.
Shows I covered on Fox last week:
Fox & Friends
The Five
The Ingraham Angle
Hannity - Tuesday night only.
The Day After the 4th GOP Debate - What’s News Nation?
Wednesday night News Nation, a relatively new 24-hour cable news network, hosted the final debate for the Republican presidential primary. The event included Nikki Haley, Florida governor Ron DeSantis, Chris Christie, and Vivek Ramaswamy.
Although News Nation tries to sell itself as a non-biased news source it seemed more like a low-rent version of Fox News complete with an ‘Island of Misfit Toys’ menagerie of disgraced television media personalities.
The debate was co-moderated by former Fox News host Megyn Kelly. News Nation also included a series of questions by Tom Fitton of Judicial Watch a far right-wing activist group. Fitton is likely an un-indicted co-conspirator in Trump’s attempts to overturn the 2020 election in Georgia.
Chris Cuomo, formerly of CNN, led the post-debate discussion which he called the ‘all-star panel” that featured three former Trump admin. officials: Sean Spicer, former White House Press secretary, Morgan Ortagus, former spokesperson for Department of State and Mick Mulvaney former White House chief of staff, along with Geraldo Rivera, a moderate journalist formerly with Fox News.
Midway through the first hour of discussion former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly joined in. Adding O’Reilly to the lineup of punditry destroyed any pretense of a moderate discourse.
The second hour of commentary featured three Republicans and a conservative - Mark Sanford, former governor of South Carolina, Scottie Nell Hughes, formerly of Russia Today, Larry Hogan, former governor of Maryland and Lindsey Granger a conservative writer.
The following morning “Fox & Friends,” opened with an extended segment about the debate. After joking a bit that they had to struggle to find News Nation in their cable packages the morning hosts praised Nikki Haley while trashing Vivek Ramaswamy.
Steve Doocy started the discussion.
“I differ a little bit with you on that because, of course, I felt like Chris Christie, he didn't point out any of Nikki Haley's flaws per se, but he did you know, it is it was spirited between he and Ron DeSantis and Vivek Ramaswamy. Ramaswamy was embarrassing. You know, he just he came in too hot once again. He got booed a number of times.
Nikki Haley, look, everybody, it was pin the tail on Nikki Haley because she has the momentum right now. She's getting a lot of donors. She's got the excitement. She was the one to beat. I don't know that Ron DeSantis changed his trajectory. Ainsley, but I think if you were going to put a one, two, three on last night, you'd have to go. One would be Nikki Haley, two, would be Ron DeSantis. I would give Chris Christie number three and Vivek Ramaswamy fourth only because he was the fourth person,” said Doocy.
Chris Christie the Day After the Debate
“Fox & Friends,” also included a brief segment with Chris Christie the day after the debate where he laid into former President Donald J. Trump.
Doocy started the round of questions from New York while Christie sat in a diner in Alabama with Lawrence Jones.
“I thought you had, like, your strongest debate, and. But when you called Donald Trump a dictator and a bully and unfit for office, you did get booed by the people there. So, when they are booing you for saying what you say is the truth, what are you thinking?” asked Doocy.
“I'm thinking that they're afraid to hear it and that you just got to keep saying it. You know, the fact is, booing something doesn't make it untrue. It is true. And by the way, you know, I said this last night, if what we want to do is reelect Joe Biden, then let's nominate a criminal to be our nominee. And if we do that, let me tell you, you think what I was doing last night was tough.
From the time he gets found guilty this spring until the election in November, that's all the Democrats are going to talk about. And if you think that's going to drop back the independents, suburban women that cost him the election in 2020, you're crazy. It's only going to get worse. And we're going to have Joe Biden and Kamala Harris,” said Christie.
“Do you think do you think you're going to be the nominee, Governor?” asked Jones.
“Absolutely, I do,” said Christie.
The Ingraham Angle - Tricky for Nikki
Later on, “The Ingraham Angle,” Laura Ingraham spent her nearly 8-minute opening monologue tearing down Nikki Haley.
“Tricky for Nikki. That's the focus of tonight's angle. Now, on paper, Nikki Haley has a lot going for her former two term governor of South Carolina, former U.N. ambassador to Donald Trump, a businesswoman, a daughter of immigrant parents. It's an attractive political resume. But just ask Jeb Bush how much resumes count in national politics.
The undeniable fact is Republican voters do not trust politicians who claim to be commonsense conservative when their actual record shows the opposite, and that they side with the same old guard that helped get us into the mess we're in right now. Last night's News Nation debate was a smack down, with both Ron DeSantis and Vivek Ramaswamy, both populist conservatives taking on Haley and challenging her real views and record on issues like protecting girls, private space and locker rooms and bathrooms. . . .Haley's the only woman on the stage, a fact that she has decided to lean into. Even though I thought Republicans value objective merit, not racial or gender based, been counting,” said Ingraham.
After her extended rant Ingraham invited Vivek Ramaswamy on to continue to the critique on his rival which led into a segment with Sean Duffy and Charlie Hurt who continued to pick apart Haley. Ingraham spent a total of 16 minutes of her 40 broadcast harshly criticizing the former governor of South Carolina, former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and the only female candidate running in the Republican presidential primary.
Hannity’s Fake Town Hall
At the very end of his show on Friday December 1st Sean Hannity announced that he would hold a “Town hall” with former president Donald J. Trump the day before the fourth Republican presidential debate.
Hannity started the broadcast started with a seven-minute segment that was a mixture of video montages and heavy-handed monologues filled with fear and paranoia. You’d think a living breathing candidate with a cult following would be enough to get the crowd going but Hannity spent seven minutes whipping them up into a frenzy of fear.
Fear of Terrorists
The first media clip was from the Senate judiciary committee hearing earlier that day in which FBI director Christopher Wray warned of the many elevated threats to the homeland.
Fear of Immigrants
Hannity pivoted to Biden’s mishandling of the southern border. He included a graphic that was meant to show how foreign nationals from various hostile countries were entering the country.
At the bottom of the two columns is the note ‘CBP data leaked to Fox News.’ A viewer would have no way to verify any of those numbers if they were secretly leaked.
Fear of the Government
Hannity then transitioned to classic Fox News mix of themes regarding government overreach, the weaponization of the DOJ and the never-ending persecution of Trump. The segment included an older clip of the former president declaring “I am your retribution.”
Fear of the Media
Hannity featured a series of media personalities, pundits and journalists warning of Trump’s dictatorial ambitions.
Fear of the United States Without Trump
Hannity wrapped up his festival of fear mongering with enthusiastic praise for the former president including exaggerated claims of past glory from his first term and unrealistic promises for the future.
Fear of Biden
In the final minute or so Hannity cast President Joe Biden as a tyrannical madman hellbent on destroying Trump and his supporters.
This was all to set up the arrival of Donald J. Trump who was sitting somewhere backstage waiting for his cue to enter.
Hannity proceeded with long leading questions meant to flatter Trump and avoid problematic answers. Trump only spoke for 26.5 minutes of the 43-minute broadcast while avoiding trickier topics like the Israel-Hamas war, abortion rights, and the war in Ukraine.
For this town hall Trump didn’t ramble on about his love for various dictators or go on long-winded tirades about the Panama Canal or water pressure as he has been known to do in past interviews.
The town hall wasn’t so much a town hall as it was an interview with adoring fans as none of the audience members were allowed to ask a question
On Wednesday the day after the debate Jessica Tarlov on the “The Five,” saw right through all of Hannity’s tricks.
“The juxtaposition of last night. So, Biden is at the fundraiser and Donald Trump is doing his town hall with Sean Hannity. And Sean was doing his best to help them out, asking questions like, hey, buddy, are you planning on being a dictator? And then floats around. He does a bunch of things. He says he's innocent. All these indictments, he's treated worse than Al Capone, blah, blah, blah.
And then he eventually gets around to saying, no, just dictator day one in terms of what I'll do on the border, etc.. And people hear that, and they hear, yeah, this guy still continues to be a threat to democracy. And you think to two days ago when Arthel Neville, our own anchor, had to beam into Trump's remarks when he said, I won the 2020 election doesn't stop with the lies about it. And you can say it's not the most important issue to people, but people have been voting on preserving democracy. And that's what Joe Biden is talking about, that he was the guy who got Trump out and he's the guy who can keep Trump out,” said Tarlov.
Ingraham - Trump is no Wannabe Dictator
On Monday Laura Ingraham addressed the same theme.
“Just as they scramble to stop the rising Trump campaign back in 2015, they're back in strafing mode again, making wild and scary predictions,” said Ingraham as she cut to an undated clip of Jen Psaki of MSNBC.
“Trump is promising to resort to an authoritarian tactic should he become president again. . . if you don’t think he’s dying to silence his critics in the media,” said Psaki.
The next clip included NY Times reporter Katie Benner also from an undated appearance on MSNBC.
“His top priority, if he becomes president, again is vengeance.”
Ingraham then switched to Joe Scarborough also of MSNBC.
“Donald Trump uses Nazi terminology to dehumanize his opponents,” said Scarborough.
Ingraham wrapped up the segment with her attempt at droll humor.
“Now the headlines are so bad, they're actually funny. From The New York Times today. Why a second Trump presidency may be more radical than his first. While he has long exhibited authoritarian impulses, blah, blah, blah, you get it,” said Ingraham.
Antisemitism on College Campuses
On Wednesday the presidents of Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania and M.I.T testified at a Congressional hearing on antisemitism on college campuses. The three women couldn’t seem to answer a simple question.
Would they discipline students calling for the genocide of Jews?
All three presidents gave some form of answer that boiled down to, “it depends on the context.”
Fox News pounced on this misstep and used it as an opportunity to trash higher education as an expensive brainwashing exercise. Laura Ingraham took the opportunity to make assumptions about the merit and qualifications of all three women.
“Were any of these women, by the way, really the most qualified individuals in America to run their respective institutions? Doubtful. But we all know that they checked enough boxes to leapfrog everyone else who was in the running for these position,” said Ingraham.
Fox News tries to position itself as a champion of Israel and Jewish Americans while also promoting conspiracy theories such as the Great Replacement, the Great Reset and Cultural Marxism that are steeped in antisemitism. Hosts on Fox News have also compared the Jewish philanthropist and political activist George Soros as a puppet-master which is another tired antisemitic trope.
Hunter Biden - the Never-Ending Story
On Friday it was announced that Hunter Biden is facing nine new tax charges in California as part of the special counsel investigation.
On Fox & Friends, Francey Hakes, a former federal prosecutor talked about the case.
“My question is, where are the charges reflecting foreign violations? Where are the charges not facing possible no bribery or public corruption. So are those to come? Because it looks to me like the special counsel should have evidence of what looks like a public corruption and money laundering scheme. But those charges are nowhere to be found in the indictment,” said Hakes.
Ainsley Earhardt quoted Rep. Jason Smith.
“Congressman Jason Smith, Republican from Missouri, he says this is far from over. Hunter attempted to evade justice by concealing his income, failing to pay his taxes and flaunting the Biden name. So they are digging into it.”
Stories Fox News Ignored
Every week I compare the hours I’ve watched on Fox with five hours of the PBS NewsHour. The following is a list of stories that PBS covered that Fox News did not.
Climate disasters
Heavy rains in East Africa have caused landslides and flooding that have killed at least 350 while displacing over 1 million across Somalia, Kenya, Ethiopia, and Tanzania. The heavy rainfall is caused by the the El Niño weather phenomenon and is expected to continue into the new year.
The European Union's Copernicus Climate Change Service announced that 2023 is the warmest year on record analyzing data from around the world.
Updates on the war in Ukraine
The U.S. Justice Department charged four Russians with war crimes against an American citizen living in Ukraine. They are accused of kidnapping the man and torturing him for 10 days in the spring of 2022. The charges are largely symbolic as the four men are not in U.S. custody.
North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum ended his campaign for president. He did not qualify for the last Republican presidential debate in Alabama.
In Indonesia an active volcano eruption killed at least 11 people while dozens are still missing. Rescue teams searched the jungles nearly Mount Merapi to find survivors.
The Supreme Court heard arguments in the controversial bankruptcy case involving the Sackler family. The Sackler family once owned Purdue Pharma a company that heavily promoted the use of opioid painkillers while obscuring the addictive nature of the drugs. The proposed settlement would give billions to victims of the epidemic while protecting the Sackler family from future drug-related civil lawsuits.
PBS produced a segment about new research that confirms an increase in cancer diagnoses among younger women. The segment focused on patients navigating the healthcare system. Most young cancer patients are not diagnosed early as their symptoms aren’t taken seriously by doctors.
Astronomers have discovered a rare solar system in the Milky Way with six planets orbiting in sync. The discovery, 100 light years away, could offer some clues about the formation of our own solar system.
PBS produced a segment about the proliferation of green energy projects in Texas. The state leads the nation in carbon free, (nuclear, solar and wind) energy production.
Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) dropped his hold on 425 military promotions. Tuberville had held up the promotions for 10 months based on his objection to the Pentagon’s policy on abortion.
Vice President Kamala Harris broke the record for Senate tie breaking votes. She has now broken 32 ties, beating the record of 31 that was set by John C. Calhoun, who was vice president from 1825 to 1832.
Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-NC) said he would not run for reelection at the end of his term after 20 years in Congress. McHenry served as interim speaker after House members ousted Rep. Kevin McCarthy.
FBI Director Christopher Wray urged Congress to renew the bureau’s authority for warrantless surveillance outside the U.S. The authority comes from section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Both Democrats and Republicans want to reform the program.
A top E.U. official issued a security warning for the holidays after a weekend fatal attack in Paris by an a man who pledged allegiance to the extremist Islamic State. The European Commission plans to spend more than $30 million on additional security, especially places of worship.
Nearly 400 Rohingya Muslim refugees are stranded off the coast of Thailand. Roughly 740,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled Buddhist-majority Myanmar to camps in Bangladesh since August 2017. Myanmar security forces have been accused of mass rapes, killings and the burning of thousands of Rohingya homes.
The Program for International Student Assessment found new evidence of worldwide learning losses due to the pandemic. Math scores in 2022 fell 15 points from four years prior. Reading scores were also down 10 points. The findings are based on testing of 15-year-olds in 80 countries including the United States.
Last week marked the 25th anniversary of the first astronauts entering the International Space Station which is set to be decommissioned in 2030. The plan to de-orbit the station will be a partnership between NASA and private companies.
For its America at a Crossroads series, PBS included a segment about the U.S. government’s policies around COVID-19 and how the virus was politicized. This segment included criticism of Fox News for pushing anti-vaccine junk science and promoting misinformation about the disease.
Some of the CEO’s of the countries biggest banks testified at the United States Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs last week to argue against new proposed banking regulations that they say would curtail lending and hurt profits. The bank executives said they need flexibility to cope with inflation and higher interest rates. Regulators argue this year’s bank failures should require big banks to hold additional capital on their balance sheets.
A district judge in Texas stepped in to allow a woman to terminate her pregnancy despite a statewide abortion ban. The woman’s fetus had a fatal abnormality that could result in a ruptured uterus. Soon after the district judge’s ruling the Attorney General of Texas threatened the woman’s doctor with criminal prosecution and blocked the abortion. The woman ended up leaving the state to have the procedure.
Six top Republican officials have been indicted in Nevada for pleading that state’s electoral votes to Donald J. Trump in 2020 as part of an illegal effort to reverse his loss to Joe Biden.
Five surviving servicemen from the Pearl Harbor attack returned to Hawaii to mark the 82nd anniversary of the aerial assault on the U.S. military. Japan’s surprise attack killed more than 2300 American servicemen and pulled the U.S. into World War 2.
“Oppenheimer,” a film about the creation of the atomic bomb that the U.S. dropped on Japan will show in theaters there after a heated debate over releasing the film.
The latest jobs report showed the U.S. economy added 199,000 new jobs with unemployment dropping from 3.9% to 3.7% which is the longest unemployment has been under 4% since the 1960s.
A woman in Kentucky, known only as Jane Doe, is suing the state for the right to an abortion. The suit, filed in state court in Louisville, says Kentucky’s near-total prohibition of abortion violates the plaintiff’s rights to privacy and self-determination under the state constitution.
The long-running court case over the Trump admin. family separation policy at the U.S. southern border is finally ended. A federal judge banned the practice for eight years. The policy was meant to deter illegal immigration. During the program some 5000 children were separated from their families.
Foreign ministers from several Arab allies of the United States were in Washington last week to meet with the Biden administration over the Israel-Hamas war. PBS featured an interview with Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud, the foreign minister from Saudi Arabia.
Americans suffering from sickle cell disease might have new hope as the FDA approved two gene therapies for the blood disorder.
The Norte Dame Cathedral in Paris, France is set to re-open to the public in one year after a devastating fire in 2019.
In Michigan, a gunman who killed four students in a school shooting was sentenced to life in prison without parole. He was 15 when he carried out the attack at Oxford High School in 2021.
Ryan O’Neal, the actor best known for the T.V. serial “Peyton Place,” and the films “Love Story,” and “Paper Moon,” died at the age of 82.