President Donald Trump’s long awaited Fox News interview with Chris Wallace was certainly worth the wait. It laid out who Trump is, what he’s likely to do next and his values. And it showed that old school style journalism is not dead.
It’s the story of two once upon a times.
Once up a time politicians would spin, manipulate facts, or do some lying. But we’ve never had a President in American history lie as much as Donald Trump. He has uplifted Lyndon Johnson’s and Richard Nixon’s Pinnocio-ish reputations. According to The Washington Post Trump has made more than 20,000 false or misleading claims. Increasingly, the old cliche joke “How can you tell he’s lying? When his lips move..” applies to Donald Trump.
Once upon a time, journalists considered themselves surrogates of the public who prepared for interviews by doing extensive research, asked tough questions, and used their research to challenge an interview subject and ask pointed questions. This kind of journalism has decreased as many cable news personalities and some anchors inject their own views, roll their eyes, laugh, do public relations style interviews, or overtly pursue partisan agendas. Chis Wallace is “old school” and his father the late Mike Wallace would be proud.
An agitated President Trump offered a string of combative and often dubious assertions in an interview aired Sunday, defending his handling of the coronavirus with misleading evidence, attacking his own health experts, disputing polls showing him trailing in his re-election race and defending people who display the Confederate flag as victims of “cancel culture.”
The president’s remarks, delivered in an interview on “Fox News Sunday,” amounted to a contentious potpourri more commonly found on his Twitter feed and at his political rallies.
The difference this time was a vigorous attempt by the host, Chris Wallace, to fact-check him, leading to several clashes between the two on matters ranging from the coronavirus response to whether Mr. Trump would accept the results of the election should he lose.
Read the article in its entirety.
The Washington Post edited highlights from this routine into a four minute video on You Tube:
Here’s the entire interview:
Here are some tidbits from the interview:
**Trump wouldn’t say whether he’d accept the election results if he loses.”
During his extensive interview with Fox News’ Chris Wallace, Trump (once again) doubled down on his groundless claim that mail-in voting would “rig” the election. After that, Wallace asked Trump “are you suggesting that you might not accept the results of the election?”
“I have to see,” Trump answered.
From there, the interview moved into a flashback of Wallace asking Trump and Hillary Clinton during a debate if they would accept the results if they lost the 2016 election. Trump wouldn’t say at the time if he would concede defeat, so Wallace asked him “can you give a direct answer that you will accept the election?”
“I have to see,” Trump responded. “No, I’m not going to just say yes. I’m not going to say no, and I didn’t last time either.”
**The cognitive test Trump brags about passing is not exactly hard.
Wallace: Incidentally, I took the test too when I heard that you passed it.
Trump: Yeah, how did you do?
Wallace: Well, it’s not the hardest test. They have a picture and it says ‘what’s that’ and it’s an elephant.
Trump: No no no…You see, that’s all misrepresentation.
Wallace: Well, that’s what it was on the web.
Trump: It’s all misrepresentation. Because, yes, the first few questions are easy, but I’ll bet you couldn’t even answer the last five questions. I’ll bet you couldn’t, they get very hard, the last five questions.
Wallace: Well, one of them was count back from 100 by seven.
**When Wallace noted that the military was in favor of renaming bases named after Confederate bigwigs Trump replied: “I don’t care what the military says.
**Trump called Dr. Anthony S. Fauci “an alamist” and tried to discredit Fauci by saying some of his earlier info wasn’t right.
Watch the full Fox News interview for more info.
Prediction: Donald Trump will appear on Fox News’ Sean Hannity within the next month where Hannity can ask him the kind of (non)questions he prefers to answer.
BOOM. @JoeBiden campaign responds to Trump's refusal to commit to accepting the results of the election should he lose:
?"The American people will decide this election and the US govt is perfectly capable of escorting trespassers out of the WH." ?
— Laffy (@GottaLaff) July 19, 2020
Every journalist in America who might have an opportunity to question Trump should lock themselves in a room with no distractions and watch the Chris Wallace interview 25 times.
— Steve Schmidt (@SteveSchmidtSES) July 19, 2020
"I don't care what the military says" is going to be SO popular with our troops https://t.co/KSlywvrAR7
— that's DOCTOR emigre80 to you, mate (@emigre80) July 19, 2020
literally all wallace did was say “thats not true” to things trump got from watching wallaces network https://t.co/mWSsynoeNF
— Andrew Lawrence (@ndrew_lawrence) July 19, 2020
Today, Trump called Fauci an alarmist.
We are approaching 150,000 deaths in the United States.
— Angry Staffer (@AngrierWHStaff) July 19, 2020
Yowza, Chris Wallace…! Now that is how you interview Trump ladies and gentleman. Chris is one of the best ever for a reason, but shit, I was waiting for the Mortal Combat narrator to yell "finish him" by the end…. Who on Trump's comms team prepped him for this?!?
— Meghan McCain (@MeghanMcCain) July 19, 2020
His legacy?
Self-pity. https://t.co/zdmCHkOPSx
— Charlie Sykes (@SykesCharlie) July 19, 2020
Trump again threatens to veto military funds because he wants to keep confederate names on forts. He asks derisively: "You gonna rename it after the Rev. Al Sharpton?"
“The military says they’re for” the bill, notes Wallace.
“I don’t care what the military says,” Trump replies.— Will Saletan (@saletan) July 19, 2020
I think I’ve watched every television interview Donald Trump has done since announcing his candidacy in 2015. Chris Wallace just did the best one, and by some distance.
— Jonathan Swan (@jonathanvswan) July 19, 2020
Biden campaign should just cut up this Trump/Fox interview into a few 60 second ads and call it a month.
— Jon Favreau (@jonfavs) July 19, 2020
Trump was stripped bare and exposed this morning as the incompetent and mendacious buffoon that he is. “It is what it is” shows how sick and callous he is. He is a grotesque and abominable man. He is also weak, brittle and self pitying. He is the antithesis of manly virtue.
— Steve Schmidt (@SteveSchmidtSES) July 19, 2020
Painful to watch, but good job by Chris Wallace.
Displays the psychological test that President Trump said he “aced” and claimed doctors were “very surprised” by his “unbelievable” results.
Wallace: The test asks you to identify an elephant. pic.twitter.com/IYSoBThrcd
— Ryan Goodman (@rgoodlaw) July 19, 2020
A tip of the Stetson to Chris Wallace. A consummate pro. Tough. Prepared. Fair. Always ready with a fact check and a follow-up question. I imagine there is quite a scene at the White House trying to contain the fallout.
— Dan Rather (@DanRather) July 19, 2020
Why did anyone at the White House think @realDonaldTrump could handle a real interview?
— Joe Lockhart (@joelockhart) July 19, 2020
Bro Chris Wallace put a graphic of the cognitive test Trump *probably* took that he’s been rambling about for weeks.
???????? pic.twitter.com/e9tbcjVcHf
— Sonoran Doggy Dogg ? (@EnuffSaidBihhh) July 19, 2020
When you lose the Fox News hosts, you know things are really, really bad. https://t.co/6Ff3n1Hz9G
— Elizabeth Thorp (@ElizabethEThorp) July 19, 2020
This is the most chilling part of the interview. We need to be ready. https://t.co/oDz2muB1ix
— Richard Stengel (@stengel) July 19, 2020
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.