'Not going down that road': Fox host shuts down guest as soon as he says 'John Kelly'
Fox News host and anchor Harris Faulkner quickly shut down a Democratic guest as soon as he brought up the name of Donald Trump’s former chief of staff, John Kelly, who this week declared the ex-president meets the “definition a ‘fascist.'”
“His former chief of staff, John Kelly, coming out —” he said before Harris interjected.
“Alright,” she declared, before her guest continued: “with these accusations —”
“You know what,” Faulkner said, talking over her guest. “I’m not going to go down that road.”
“She used the backdrop of the Naval Observatory,” Faulkner said, “to bring up some some items that were years old and without much time left, I would love for us to go into it…”
Rather than allowing her guests to continue on that topic, she called for their last quick thoughts.
Faulkner closed by asking, “I just want to know, where’s the joy? Because he’s dancing and she’s no longer joyful. Find the joy.”
Some Democrats avoid right-wing Fox News and its sister channel Fox Business altogether. But 2024 Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris, who has made a concerted effort to reach out to conservatives, was recently interviewed by Fox News' Bret Baier. And Harris campaign spokesman Ian Sams has been a frequent guest on Fox News.
According to Axios' Sophia Cai, Sams' frequent appearances on Fox News are infuriating former President Donald Trump.
"Sams has appeared on Fox News several times in the past two weeks to throw darts at Trump, prompting the ex-president and his staff to fire off dozens of social media posts blasting Sams — and essentially accusing the conservative network of betrayal," Cai observes. "Zoom in: Sams, a longtime Democratic operative, was on Fox four times in five days last week. He brought up Trump's actions on Jan. 6, his refusal to release his medical records and his handling of the pandemic — all while defending Harris on one of Trump's go-to media outlets."
Trump has been raging at Sams on his Truth Social platform.
In one of the posts, Trump wrote, "Sams is just a below average guy, with memorized FAKE NEWS soundbites, almost all of which are WRONG." And in another, the former president ranted, "Does Ian Sams, Lyin' Kamala's Special Advisor, own Fox News? He is on all the time, as are so many other of her other supporters."
Sams, Cai notes, took another jab at Trump during a Sunday, October 20 appearance on MSNBC.
Sams told MSNBC, "I'm just a spokesperson. I don't know why Donald Trump seems to be spending his time TiVoing Fox News appearances and lashing out against spokespeople. That's not something the vice president does. She thinks more about the country and what she wants to do as president than who's on cable news talking about her."
A Fox News pundit's attempt to dismiss reports that former President Donald Trump wished his generals were more like high-ranking Nazis failed to convince a swath of his viewers.
Howard Alan Kurtz on Thursday tried to diminish the significance of former White House chief of staff John Kelly's on-the-record statement that Trump had positive things to say about Nazi generals, arguing he may have been "letting off steam."
This prompted Georgetown University law and politics professor Josh Chafetz to respond, "How do these people not understand that 'He only rants about wanting to be like Hitler in private!' is not actually reassuring?"
Trump's worrying statements include racial attacks on Vice President Kamala Harris and immigrants he says have "bad genes," demands the U.S. Constitution be "terminated," and promises to punish political opponents whom he describes as the "enemy within" and ally Tucker Carlson described as bad little girls about to get a spanking from daddy.
This may be why some viewers were loath to accept the theory that Trump's praise of Nazi generals was no more than a tension-release exercise.
"I think this segment, more than any, hits on the head that talking about Hitler in relation to a candidate, in any way, shape or form, is probably not a good thing," said public relations executive Chris Harihar.
"I often valorize Hitler when I find myself angry," replied a sarcastic Lee Kovarsky, professor of law at the University of Texas.
Media strategist Tom Domke concluded, "So the closing argument from [Fox News] is that sometimes Trump can’t control himself and to 'let off steam' he may need Nazi generals to carry out his orders."
Added liberal radio show host Dean Obeidallah, "Fox News just found a new way to normalize Trump's love of Hitler!"
Meanwhile, in the final days of the presidential election, lies about noncitizens voting, the vulnerability of mail-in ballots and the security of voting machines are spreading widely over social media.
Fanned by former President Donald Trump and notable allies such as tech tycoon Elon Musk, election disinformation is warping voters’ faith in the integrity of the democratic process, polls show, and setting the stage once again for potential public unrest if the Republican nominee fails to win the presidency. At the same time, federal officials are investigating ongoing Russian interference through social media and shadow disinformation campaigns.
The “firehose” of disinformation is working as intended, said Pamela Smith, president and CEO of Verified Voting, a nonpartisan group that advocates for responsible use of technology in elections.
“This issue is designed to sow general distrust,” she said. “Your best trusted source is not your friend’s cousin’s uncle that you saw on Twitter. It’s your local election official. Don’t repeat it. Check it instead.”
With early voting ongoing, local officials such as Travis Doss in Augusta, Georgia, say they are fighting a losing battle against fast-moving social media rumors.
Doss, the executive director of the Richmond County Board of Elections, said many voters in his county do not believe absentee ballots are counted properly. Many think election officials are choosing which ballots to count based on the neighborhood from where they’re sent, or that voting machines are easily hacked.
In recent weeks, Doss himself heard a rumor that a local preacher told his entire congregation to register to vote again because the preacher had heard — falsely — that everyone had been removed from the voter registration rolls.
“Somebody hears something and then they tell people, and it’s the worst game of telephone tag there ever is,” Doss said. “It’s so hard to correct all the misinformation because there’s so many things out there that we don’t even know about.”
The amount of disinformation spreading throughout the country is immense.
College students in Wisconsin have been targeted with text messages meant to intimidate them into not voting, even when they’re eligible. The Michigan State Police had to correct rumors that people were unlawfully tampering with voting machines in one precinct, when it was actually two clerk’s office employees testing the ballot tabulating devices. Scammers posing as election officials have been calling Michigan voters claiming they must provide their credit card and Social Security numbers to vote early.
Ongoing lies
Musk, the owner of the social media platform X (formerly known as Twitter), has gorged on a smorgasbord of common election conspiracy theories. At a recent Trump rally in Pennsylvania, he falsely insinuated that voting machines designed by Dominion Voting Systems could steal this election from Trump. Dominion successfully sued Fox News and others for promoting that lie after the 2020 election.
Last month, Musk posted that Democrats are expediting citizenship for immigrants living in the country illegally so the party could get a permanent electoral advantage. Journalists have thoroughly debunked his claim. Trying to stir up anti-immigrant sentiment to motivate voters to the polls, Trump and his allies have for months repeated the lie that noncitizens are voting in droves.
Musk shared a bogus claim about widespread voter fraud in a Wisconsin county in the 2020 election. The targeted jurisdiction, Henrico County, posted a thread on X correcting Musk’s assertions with data. Musk also amplified a claim that Michigan’s voter rolls were packed with inactive voters and ripe for fraud. Top state officials had to rebut those false claims too.
Beyond Musk’s posts, disinformation has thrived on X.
The American Sunlight Project, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit that fights misleading information and is run by the former head of a U.S. Department of Homeland Security disinformation team, released a report this month on the scope of the problem. The report found that nearly 1,200 likely automated accounts on X are spreading Russian propaganda and pro-Trump disinformation about the presidential election.
And nearly half the Republican candidates running for top state offices or Congress have questioned the integrity of this year’s election, primarily through social media, according to an analysis by The Washington Post. Many of the candidates’ posts include falsehoods.
Sustained lies about election integrity have consequences: State and local election officials have been bombarded by threats and harassment this year, and confidence in elections has plummeted.
According to an October NPR/PBS News/Marist poll, more than 3 in 4 Americans remain confident or very confident that state and local agencies will carry out a fair and accurate election.
Still, 58% of Americans say they are concerned or very concerned that voter fraud will occur this year. Among Republicans polled, 86% are concerned about fraud, while 55% of independents and 33% of Democrats have a similar fear.
