Fox News has put out one of its classic, biting official statements — this one mercilessly denying Republican 2016 Presidential nominee wannabe Donald Trump’s suggestion that star anchor Megyn Kelly’s vacation was due to him. Implication: that Fox News had put her on vacation to punish her for the sin of asking tough questions of him during the recent Republican debate.
It’s not unusual for media types — particularly well paid ones — to go on vacation during the summer months. In this case, when Kelly announced she was taking a vacation the conspiracy theories almost immediately began. Why, Trump supporters would suggest, it had to be due to Trump having won in his battle with Fox. Mediaiate reports:
Megyn Kelly announced two days ago that she would be taking a ten day break from the show while she went on vacation with her family, like many in the media do during the summer months.
Following the announcement, rumors spread throughout the Internet suggesting that the real reason for Kelly’s absence was because chairman Roger Ailes was acquiescing to Donald Trump‘s demands as a result of his ongoing feud with Kelly. Mediaite has received confirmation that Kelly’s break was scheduled before the Republican debate, but theories have persisted and Trump implied that he was the reason for Kelly’s absence in an interview with Newsmax today.
On Friday night, Mediaite received this statement from a Fox spokesperson, emphasizing that Kelly’s break was scheduled.
And it is a take-no-prisoners one:
“The conspiracy theories about Megyn Kelly’s vacation rank up there with UFO’s, the moon landing and Elvis being alive. Megyn is on a pre-planned, annual summer vacation with her family, which is much deserved. To imply otherwise as Donald Trump and his campaign operatives have is not only wildly irresponsible, but downright bizarre. Perhaps Mr. Trump thinks it’s advantageous to his poll numbers to keep talking about Megyn, but that doesn’t change the fact that Roger Ailes has fully supported her and her tough journalistic questioning since day one and is thrilled with the added exposure from the debate which resulted in even higher ratings of The Kelly File this week. Anyone who knows Roger is aware of how historically and consistently loyal he is to all of his talent and how he protects them at all costs. As Governor Terry Branstad said today, ‘when you’re a candidate, you’ve got to basically answer the questions. You can’t just attack the person asking the questions. That doesn’t work.’”
The way Trump supporters, others, and Trump himself have kept the theory alive is yet another indication of how modern politics and media now work. Gone are the days when many readers would expect the information they read to have been reported and confirmed. Much of what is spread in a 24/7 media always starving for new tidbits (and controversy) is based on supposition, invention or partial or no facts. Partisans and supporters of candidates grasp each perhaps leaky straw and try to hold it up as statement of fact, or one that “anyone would know” is true.
The Fox News statement suggests that an uneasy truce is in force between the network and the reality show star and billionaire who seems to be spawning groupies like a political Justin Beiber. And some of Trump’s supporters are political Beliebers: woe to those who diss him or side against him, as conservative pundit and Trump critic Eric Erickson recently found out (CAUTION this is a link to a Redstate.com post with very adult language).
This CNN account of the cease-fire remains the most intriguing:
After a weekend’s worth of stressful phone calls, the tacit agreement — he thought — was that Trump would stop attacking Ailes’ biggest television star, Megyn Kelly, in interviews and tweets.
Then came an ugly surprise. Trump said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” that he thought Kelly should apologize to him.
“This was the final straw for Roger,” according to a source close to the situation.
Ailes’ office called Trump’s office. We “can resolve this now,” Ailes said to Trump, “or we can go to war.”
As we all know by now, war was averted. There is mutual respect between the two master negotiators. Trump has stopped criticizing Kelly. And Fox has stopped ignoring Trump on its shows
AND:
The behind-the-scenes calls seemed to be bearing fruit by Sunday night. But then came Trump’s assertion, bright and early Monday on “Morning Joe,” that Kelly should apologize. It might have made his supporters happy, but it made Ailes exceedingly unhappy.
On the ensuing phone call, there was “very blunt” talk from both sides, including Ailes’ warning of war, two of the sources said.
There was an “instant understanding between two titans that this was over,” one of the sources said. Trump wouldn’t apologize, Kelly wouldn’t apologize, but both sides would move on.
Trump tweeted about the phone call right afterward and said he’d been assured that “‘Trump’ will be treated fairly” by Fox.
The sources for this story contradicted New York magazine’s assertion that Ailes called Trump repeatedly and “begged” the candidate to tweet that they’d settled their feud. “Neither of them would beg for anything,” one of the sources said.
In a statement on Monday night, Ailes said “the air has been cleared” with Trump but added he supported Kelly “100%.”
When Kelly’s show started at 9 p.m., hundreds of thousands of extra viewers turned on Fox. She very briefly acknowledged the controversy and moved on — no “milking it for the ratings,” as one rival executive said — but she still easily scored the night’s highest cable news ratings, beating the usual winner, Fox’s 8 p.m. “O’Reilly Factor.”
So much for the threatened boycott by Trump supporters.
The piece ends with this:
While Trump has been placated, tensions with Fox linger right beneath the surface. Some network executives are said to detest Trump’s bombastic behavior.
And it hasn’t helped that many commentators have portrayed Ailes as buckling or bowing to Trump. (Sample quote via The Washington Post: “Give credit where it’s due — Trump bargained with Fox News, Trump won, and it wasn’t close.”)
Trump still seems to have a sore spot about coverage of his campaign; he tweeted some gripes to Fox host Eric Bolling on Monday night, for example.
And on Wednesday, Trump committed to an exclusive Sunday morning interview with NBC’s Chuck Todd this weekend. This could be interpreted as a snub of Fox’s Chris Wallace since Fox had been in talks with Trump’s campaign about an in-person interview with Wallace for “Fox News Sunday.”
Trump won’t soon forget the feeling of being beaten up on Fox’s debate stage. It remains to be seen if he will show up to Fox’s November and January debates.
And Ailes won’t soon forget that Trump triggered days of references to Kelly’s “blood.”
Maybe the two men have met their match.
Regardless, the match goes on…
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.