Susan B. Glasser has a new article in The New Yorker noting how infrequently Fox News is covering its once darling former president, Donald Trump, and noting that Fox News made no mention of the pending lawsuit between the network and Dominion Voting Systems.
“It was a slow news week in Washington, at least if you watched Fox News,” Glasser began, “two of the network’s marquee prime-time hosts, Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity, retreated to their safe space, devoting long opening segments to bashing President Biden.”
Hannity for his part focused on Biden’s long-ago friendship with the deceased Democratic Senator Robert Byrd who had been a member of the Ku Klux Klan before renouncing the group. Carlson, meanwhile, argued that Biden’s age made him unfit for the presidency.
Glasser mocks both Hannity and Carlson for their segments, breezily dismissing the coverage. “For Fox, these monologues are what you talk about when you don’t have anything else to talk about, like when a comedian runs out of material and starts making jokes about the weather.”
Yeah, well, you know what’s like a comedian who has run out of material joking about the weather?
A liberal ripping on Fox News coverage.
And yes, Fox’s coverage is tired and often ridiculous; Biden’s relationships with controversial Senators and Biden’s age are well-treaded territory for Fox News. But imagine the inverse coverage on a network like CNN if Trump, or any Republican, had been friendly with a former Klansman. Or if Trump was over 80 years old and was having trouble speaking.
Yes, Fox is often absurd, as Glasser points out (case and point: Carlson arguing that Biden’s age is an indication that America is succumbing to “the trans agenda and climate theology.”)
But I’ve got a feeling The New Yorker and it’s well-to-do readers wouldn’t let a Trump-Klansman connection go either.
Fox spent the rest of the week exposing “the dangerous perfidy of America’s elites.” So, standard stuff: Hillary Clinton and her emails; “Democratic donors” and the opioid crisis; funding Ukraine; Lori Lightfoot; the lab leak theory. Glasser dismisses all of these concerns, some of which are trite Fox nonsense (Hillary’s emails, for example), some of which are legitimate (the lab leak theory), in the casual, above-it-all way that screams Ivy leaguer turner New Yorker staff writer; the way that has caused middle America to disassociate from the coasts.
After Glasser has run through everything (and implicitly dismissed everything) Fox did mention over the week, she turns to what “Fox hosts did not mention”: Dominion Voting Systems and their pending lawsuit against Fox News claiming $1.6 billion in damages. Glasser writes about Fox’s omission from coverage of the Dominion lawsuit as slightly conspiratorial – but defendants in lawsuits are not in the habit of speaking publicly about pending litigation. It would be weird if Fox did cover the suit that they are currently defending themselves against.
What’s more notable, and where Glasser is on to something, is that Fox rarely seems to mention Donald Trump anymore.
Fox News Wants to Move on from Donald Trump
Apparently, Fox owner Rupert Murdoch would like for the GOP to move beyond Trump; Murdoch seems to prefer Florida Governor Ron DeSantis for the GOP ticket and DeSantis seems to be enjoying favorable coverage throughout Murdoch’s media empire. DeSantis just released a new book, the poorly titled “The Courage to be Free,” and has been touring Murdoch outlets to promote the release.
MORE: Pete Buttigieg Is Destroying Himself
MORE: Are We Watching the End of Donald Trump?
MORE: Liz Cheney: Could She Join the Democratic Party?
MORE: Liz Cheney: The Next President of the United States?
Regardless, Trump remains a persistently relevant presence in conservative circles, whether or not Fox News, or Susan Glasser, approves.
Harrison Kass is the Senior Editor at 19FortyFive. An attorney, pilot, guitarist, and minor pro hockey player, Harrison joined the US Air Force as a Pilot Trainee but was medically discharged. Harrison holds a BA from Lake Forest College, a JD from the University of Oregon, and an MA from New York University. Harrison listens to Dokken.
