Trump Lashes Out at Fox Hosts Live on Air After Negative Debate Review
After falling short in his debate with Kamala Harris Tuesday night, Donald Trump is lashing out at his favorite network.
Speaking on Fox News Wednesday morning, Trump told Fox & Friends that he would prefer Sean Hannity, Jesse Watters, or Laura Ingraham to moderate any future debate, saying that Watters “was fantastic last night, what he said.”
“Jesse really got it. Jesse said that Trump won that debate. We won that debate by a lot. No, I wouldn’t want Martha involved. But I would take some others, yeah,” Trump said, arguing that Bret Baier and Martha McCallum aren’t qualified to moderate.
Live on Fox, Trump insults the two Fox anchors who have been pitched as debate moderators – Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum – and says "I wouldn't want to have" them. He says he would want Sean Hannity, Jesse Watters or Laura Ingraham to host instead. (An obvious non-starter.) pic.twitter.com/uXVJtnYn8L
— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) September 11, 2024
The small amount of praise that Trump received Tuesday night came from Hannity and Watters. Hannity said that the biggest loser in the debate was ABC, while Watters, trying to spin the debate in favor of the former president, said that “all of the memorable lines were from Donald Trump.”
Just pure cope from Jesse Watters: I don’t think the American people were watching thinking any of these people won… all the memorable lines were from Trump. He had some great knock outs pic.twitter.com/imEdza8Btx
— Acyn (@Acyn) September 11, 2024
Trump may not be willing to admit it, but he probably knows that his debate performance was a disaster. Harris’s strategy Tuesday night was to bait Trump into being himself and shooting his mouth off, and she succeeded, getting him to sound like right-wing mad libs at times. He went on a long-winded, inaccurate rant about Afghanistan, claimed that he had “concepts of a plan” on health care, and gave a disturbing answer about January 6.
Getting friendlier moderators may be the only way Trump could look better in a future debate. But it’s a very long shot that Kamala Harris would agree to a debate with his favorite anchors, as she already rejected a Fox News debate that Trump wanted to have on September 4. Plus, there’s the well-known fact that the conservative network is biased toward Trump and wants him to win. If Trump wants another debate, he’s going to have to go to a network that his supporters don’t run. Is he desperate enough to take the risk of being trounced again?