Fox News’ town hall with Trump revealed its news division for the sham it is

On March 5, President Donald Trump did a town hall with Fox News anchors Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum. The format, in which a member of an audience asked a question and then there were follow-ups from the moderators, was ripe for good, strong questioning. Instead, at various key points, the duo’s follow-up questions were tepid or essentially non-existent and it isn’t surprising that after the town hall, the audience didn't actually know more about Trump’s positions on many of the issues discussed.

Here are four key exchanges.

Coronavirus / COVID-19 questioning

From the March 5, 2020, edition of Fox News' Democracy 2020: Town Hall with President Trump

KATHERINE PUGH: Mr. President, at the outset of the coronavirus, your administration's response seemed to some as being confusing or minimizing. What plans are being considered on a federal level for the possibility of a long-term disruption from the novel coronavirus?

DONALD TRUMP: Well actually, we are giving, I think really given tremendous marks. You look at Gallup poll, you look at other polls for the way we have really handled it and one of the things I did is I closed down the borders to China and to other areas that are very badly affected and really having a lot of troubles. I mean, countries and areas of countries that have had a lot of problems and I closed them down very early against the advice of almost everybody, and we've been given rave reviews.

And that's why we have only -- right now -- it's a lot of people, but it's still 11 people versus tremendous numbers of thousands of people that have died all over the world. We have 11.

We have 149 cases as of this moment, this morning it was 129, and I just see right now it's about 149 cases, there are 100,000 cases all over the world. So, we are really given tremendous marks for having made the decision, it was a decision I made, to close down the border so that people from China, where we take in thousands and thousands of people a day, they stopped coming in very early, weeks ahead of where they normally would've been stopped.

BRET BAIER (HOST): Mr. President, you -- you've said you want to take politics out of dealing with this crisis, but in the White House yesterday, you said that, about the testing kits and the delay, you blamed President Obama.

TRUMP: Well, I don't blame anybody, I want to get everybody to understand they made some decisions which were not good decisions. We inherited decisions that they made and that's fine --

BAIER: As far as regulations?

TRUMP: We undid -- yes, we undid some of the regulations that were made that made it very difficult, but I'm not blaming anybody. It just seems that the Democrats -- some of them, I must say, and you know it better than anybody, Bret, it's become much better, but some of the Democrats have said no matter what -- if we found a cure and everybody is better tomorrow morning at 9 o'clock, they would say, "He's done a terrible job." It's just automatic.

How is the president doing? Oh, terrible, terrible. They don't mean it, and we've done a great job. Again, we've gotten the highest poll numbers of anybody for this kind of a thing. And it's -- and the other thing, I'm working with phenomenal people with CDC and all of the people involved. Mike Pence is doing a fantastic job. I mean, Mike Pence is working 20 hours a day or more on this and really doing a fantastic job.

BAIER: I guess the critics say that why wait until the testing issue became a crisis before dealing with it? If you want to change regulations, why not change them change them either when you took office or when you first learned of the virus in January? For example, South Korea really got their act together right away. That's what they say.

TRUMP: Well, you know, when you say take office, we just learned about this a very short while ago.

BAIER: Sure, but -- or when you learned about the virus --

TRUMP: I know, but we're not going to be -- thinking about a lot of other things too, like trade and millions of other things. I mean, we are doing some job with the economy, you know, so I'm not thinking about this. But as soon as I heard that China had a problem, I said, "What's going on with China? How many people are coming in?" Nobody but me asked that question. And you know better than -- again, you know, you both know that I closed the borders very early and were given A+s for this --

BAIER: And you were given applause for that --

TRUMP: Saved a lot of lives --

BAIER: But I'm just talking about the testing -- the testing kits.

TRUMP: Well, the testing, we did it as soon as we found out that it was a problem, we did it. It's not the kind of a thing, you say, “Gee, I just got elected, let's do some testing on this." They had some bad decisions, some bad decisions were made. We corrected those decisions.

MARTHA MACCALLUM (HOST): So, obviously you care a lot about the economy and we are seeing some impacts. It's kind of surprising how many conferences are being shut down and meetings are being canceled and flights, a lot of flights have being canceled, even the James Bond movie they are delaying because of coronavirus. I'm wondering what you think is the long term, you know, over the course of the year -- Wall Street says that they don't expect U.S. companies to have any growth in 2020, which is pretty surprising. What's the impact on the economy and also potentially on your reelection?

TRUMP: Well, I think people are viewing us as having done a very good job, what we have to do is do a very professional job. Nobody is blaming us for the virus. Nobody. I mean, I haven't heard that even from some of the so-called enemies, or whatever you want to call them, they're not blaming us. This started in China. How it started is questioned, but thousands of thousands of cases in China, and it infiltrated up to almost 100 countries right now.

MACCALLUM: But I'm not talking about the handling of it --

TRUMP: Nobody's blaming me.

MACCALLUM: Excuse me, I don't mean to interrupt, but I'm just asking about, you know, in terms of things you can't control, right? The impact on the economy, and that potentially, you know, that could, if people feel like the economy is turning around, that that could be an election issue as you go into it.

TRUMP: Well, look, we were set to hit 30,000 on the Dow, this is a number that nobody ever even came close to and already we have the number and even though it's down 10 or 11%, it's still the highest it's ever been by far. It certainly might have an impact.

At the same time, I have to say people are now staying in the United States, spending their money in the U.S. and I like that. You know, I have been after that for a long time. You know that. I have been saying stay in the U.S., spend your money here, and they are doing that. They are sort of enforced doing that. We met with the airline companies yesterday. They are doing a fantastic job and they're just not flying to areas that have a big problem. So, it's going to all work out. Everybody has to be calm, it's all going to work out.

BAIER: But to Katherine's original question, there is a long-term plan if it lasts longer than you think?

TRUMP: Sure, we could have a very long-term plan. We hope that doesn't happen, but we have plans for every single possibility, and I think that's what we have to do. We hope it doesn't last too long.

When a participant said the administration’s response “seemed to some as being confusing or minimizing” and asked Trump what “plans are being considered” to actually deal with a sustained coronavirus disruption, Trump pivoted to talking about how great he thinks his administration is (not true).

Baier then asked Trump about him blaming former President Barack Obama for his administration’s missteps, but crucially, he let Trump pivot to vaguely talk about Obama-era regulations. “We inherited decisions that they made,” Trump said. “We undid some of the regulations.” Baier did not try to get Trump on the record about what those regulations were. He also did not mention that Trump fired the Obama-era pandemic response leadership teams.

Baier then pivoted to talking about the administration’s horrible response with the roll-out of the testing kits, and after a few questions, Trump seemed to think Baier was asking why the administration was not testing for the coronavirus in 2017, and responded, “The testing, we did it as soon as we found out that it was a problem, we did it. It's not the kind of a thing, you say, ‘Gee, I just got elected, let's do some testing on this.’”

As it became clear that the president had no idea what he was talking about, MacCallum intervened, changing the topic to the economy. Trump at first seemed to acknowledge that there might be an economic impact but again pivoted, essentially denying what he just said and contradicting demonstrable facts.

In the end, Baier returned to the original question of what the administration’s long-term plan was to deal with the coronavirus. Trump’s response: “Sure, we could have a very long-term plan. We hope that doesn’t happen.”

In short, all that came out of this extended back-and-forth was Trump claims that his administration is amazing and vague hints that the president of the United States has no idea what’s going on with this pandemic. Baier asked Trump about the massive problems with testing but did not address all of the other massive problems and confusing responses.

Obamacare and coverage for preexisting conditions

From the March 5, 2020, edition of Fox News' Democracy 2020: Town Hall with President Trump

AUDREY STREIN: I want to say, Republicans have failed to come up with an alternative plan to Obamacare. How do you plan to rally the Republicans around a plan, and what would be included in that?

DONALD TRUMP: Thank you very much, That's a great question, and very important, healthcare, and I think it's probably the thing that I'm most disappointed that I haven't been able to say what a good job we've done. I haven't been able to sell what a great job we have done.

First of all, I got rid of the individual mandate which was the worst part of Obamacare. That's where you paid a fortune not to pay for horrible health care and insurance, and it had a tremendous impact. Preexisting conditions, 100% we take care of, but we have many health care plans now where it's 60%, even 65% less-expensive than Obamacare. It's better than Obamacare.

And what we really have left is the carcass of Obamacare or you could call it new health care, because without preexisting -- without -- without the whole thing with the individual mandate, it's a whole different ball game. It's a much different -- it's a much different plan.

And what we would like to do is totally kill it, but come up -- before we do that, with something that's great. What we've done is we've really managed Obamacare, the remaining portion. We got rid of the bad part, but the remaining portion really well, and, you know, before I got involved, you know what was happening with the rates on Obamacare? They were going up at levels that nobody has ever seen before. We are managing it. And I had a decision to make, this was very important, I said to my people, and we have great people, Seema, Azar, I mean, great people that are so good at it, I said, “You know, I have a little problem. Do we manage it great until we get something much better? Or do we manage it poorly, and say Obamacare is horrible?" And I said “We've got to do the right thing, we've got to manage it really, really good."

So, it's not great health care, but we are managing it fantastically, and you don't see all those stories about the rates going through the roof anymore because we know we're doing. At the same time, we want to get you really fantastic healthcare. If we can win back the House, we will be able to do that. We have to win back the House, keep the Senate, keep the White House, we'll be able to do that.

MARTHA MACCALLUM (HOST): Mr. President, I want to follow up on that because the issue of preexisting conditions,you say you're going to protect them --

TRUMP: Right.

MACCALLUM: But your administration is also fighting Obamacare in the courts. So, how do you -- how do you promise people that you're going to protect them based on that?

TRUMP: That's what I said, we want to terminate Obamacare because it's bad -- look, we're running it really well, but we know it's defective, it's very defective. We got rid of the worst part and that was a very important thing, you know, getting rid of the individual mandate was a very important thing.

But we, we want to get something -- if we can get the House, you'll have the best health care and health insurance, anywhere on the planet. But we have to get the House back. Now, that means we to hold the Senate, we have to get the House, we have to obviously keep the White House.

But what we are doing is managing it really well. Now, it's a case -- it's called Texas versus -- you understand, it's Texas is suing, they want to terminate it. But everybody there is also saying -- and everybody -- we have our great senator from Pennsylvania , thank you very much Pat for being here, and -- Pat Toomey, and -- but very important, and by the way, our great congressman, I have to say they were warriors, right? Real warriors, in terms of the fake impeachment, I will tell you that.

But -- so, Texas is -- and it's Texas and many states, they are trying to terminate, but they want to put something that's much better. They're terminating it to put much better and they've all pledged that preexisting conditions, a hundred percent taken care of.

Asked about the Affordable Care Act and preexisting conditions, Trump’s response was basically to insult Obamacare without, again, giving any real insight to show that he knew what he was talking about. (He seemed to confuse junk health care plans that are cheap with quality plans that cost more.) MacCallum asked Trump “how do you promise people that you're going to protect” preexisting conditions given that the Trump administration is trying to kill Obamacare in the courts (and may do so shortly after the election).

Trump’s response -- which was essentially multiple versions of “we want to terminate Obamacare because it's bad [but] we're running it really well” -- clarified nothing. The anchors did not follow up. There was no actual clarity to anyone watching, be they experts or medical professionals or the public.

When talking about progressive plans to expand health care coverage, Fox News personalities have said that such proposals are a ploy to buy votes. Trump promised that if Republicans take over the Congress in November, they will provide “the best health care and health insurance anywhere on the planet.” That’s as specific as Trump got, and neither Baier nor MacCallum followed up to ask what the hell he was talking about.

One easy follow-up would have been about the health care bill that Republicans tried to pass the last time they held the White House and both chambers of Congress in 2017. That bill, the American Health Care Act, would have severely cut Medicaid, given a massive tax cut to the wealthy, dramatically increased the number of uninsured Americans, allowed insurers to jack up premiums for the elderly, and allowed states to opt out of the essential health benefits package and remove protections for individuals with preexisting conditions. That’s a lot of things that Baier or MacCallum could have mentioned. They didn’t bring up even one.

It is worth noting here that the AHCA was the brainchild of Fox Corp. board member Paul Ryan, the speaker of the House at the time, who has now promised that health care will be on the agenda if Trump wins a second term.

Cuts to Medicare and Social Security

From the March 5, 2020, edition of Fox News' Democracy 2020: Town Hall with President Trump

BRET BAIER (HOST): Also a lot of questions, Mr. President about the national debt. Since being president you signed into law $4.7 trillion of debt including 2.1 trillion of discretionary spending, understand that you're spending on the military as well.

DONALD TRUMP: Right.

BAIER: When you ran for president, at one point, you said that you would pay off the debt within eight years. So now, we're about four years in and the debt is up $3.5 trillion, that's about 18%. Republicans and Democrats obviously are not talking about the national debt a lot on Capitol Hill or on the campaign trail. So, do you --

TRUMP: But I talk about it --

BAIER: Do you care about the national debt?

TRUMP: I do, very much, and I will always talk about it because to me, it's very important. Now, the good thing about the debt is we're paying very little interest, almost nothing. This is a great interest climate. In fact, I want to refinance the debt. But I had to fix the military. The military was depleted. I had to fix the military.

It's one thing to say -- it's one thing to say, “Gee, we did a good job on the debt," or “Gee, we did a good job on the budget" and then have people from other countries running up the White House lawn. You know? Maybe they took over our country, but I did one hell of a job on the budget, right?

No, I had to fix the military, $2.5 trillion dollars, we had to do other things. The country when I took it over was in very bad shape. Remember this, President Obama had -- he more than doubled -- he put more debt on than all of the other presidents of the United States combined. Combined all the debt of every other president, and I took it over, we had 20 -- we had $20 trillion worth of debt on the country and actually more than that.

But he -- and we had a lot of commitments for other things. And on top of it, you know, it's one thing, you take over something and you have debt, you have a building, you have debt, but the building's fixed up -- the country was a mess. We're in all these wars all over the place --

BAIER: So, this would be a focus of a second term?

TRUMP: Oh, absolutely, but when the trade deals kick in, now, again, we were disturbed by what's going on with the virus but that's going to be fine and everybody -- it's going to be fine. But, you know, that was a disturbance.

But I will say this, we -- when these -- when these trade deals kick in-- and when all -- you know the economy is the best economy we've ever had? It's nothing compared to what it's going to be when the trade deals kick in.

MARTHA MACCALLUM (HOST): But if you -- if you don't cut something in entitlements, you'll never really deal with the debt.

TRUMP: We will be cutting, but we're also going to have growth like you've never had before. We've never had growth like we're experiencing -- we will be experiencing when they kick in -- China as an example, they didn't do anything with us. They're now spending $250 billion a year, and that's only for phase one. Phase two is going to be even more so.

It's $250 billion. I just made a deal with Japan where they're paying 40 billion, they never give us anything. All they do is sell his cars for no tax coming into the country. South Korea, you know, I made a deal and then I made the USMCA deal with Canada and Mexico, replacing the worst deal which was made by -- by the way, which was made by Joe.

OK, I didn't want to say "Sleepy Joe" because I want to be respected, I want to -- I want to respect him.

BAIER: But you got it in there anyway.

TRUMP: He looked like he's going to be a candidate, and I just say, “How did that happen?"

So, but no -- into it and I just say how did that happen?

So, but --no, Joe Biden, in all fairness -- Joe Biden made a deal, NAFTA, he approved it, he was pushing it. It's the worst trade deal ever made. We're terminating NAFTA, we have the USMCA.

Asked about the national debt (a Fox obsession in the Obama years but an afterthought now), Trump again made an over-the-top promise, this time of ridiculous, never-before-seen growth, saying, “You know the economy is the best economy we've ever had? It's nothing compared to what it's going to be when the trade deals kick in.” MacCallum, who has used her perch at Fox News to call for Social Security cuts and raising the retirement age, then pressed Trump on cutting entitlements.

It’s not clear if Trump, who has been president for three years, knew that entitlements meant Social Security and Medicare as he pivoted to economic growth in his response.

But Baier and MacCallum had the responsibility to figure that out. Cutting Social Security and Medicare is kind of a big deal -- they’re two of the most popular programs in American history. (The Bush administration tried to partially privatize Social Security and failed; the administration also tried to cut Medicare.)

Instead, Trump changed the topic to Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden and trade. And even there, neither MacCallum nor Baier asked about issues like record farm bankruptcies or other fallout from Trump’s trade war.

Taking the oil

From the March 5, 2020, edition of Fox News' Democracy 2020: Town Hall with President Trump

Amid a discussion about American foreign policy in the Middle East, during which Baier and MacCallum were both repeatedly hypothesizing about a need to send more troops to Afghanistan or elsewhere in the region, Trump openly admitted to engaging in a possible war crime. But no one followed-up with him about it.

Trump plainly admitted that he’s using American soldiers to take oil in and near Syria: “We have an oil area in, near Syria, and in Syria, we kept it. So, the only soldiers I have over there, they're guarding the oil, we kept the oil. So, we kept the treasure. That's OK.”

MacCallum immediately changed the subject.

Fallout post town hall

While Democratic town halls on Fox News are followed by Fox figures engaging in conspiracy theories and wanton attacks, Fox & Friends gushed over Trump the next morning.

This is entirely the point. Fox News is not just a right-leaning network. It functions as part of the Trump administration. Democrats thinking of how to deal with it would be wise to take that into account.

Fox News' Trump town hall was a joke

Coronavirus / COVID-19 questioning

Obamacare and coverage for preexisting conditions

Cuts to Medicare and Social Security

Taking the oil

Fallout post town hall

Trump set to appoint Project 2025 architect Russ Vought to Office of Management and Budget

Trump’s pick for secretary of defense has a history of defending war crimes, torture, and more

Jesse Watters celebrates Donald Trump’s promise to use the military to deport immigrants “the hard way”

Charlie Kirk promises mass deportations and warns: “If a Democrat gets in our way, well, then Matt Gaetz very well might go arrest you”

Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts promotes the convention of states: “We realize the objective isn't just short term. It's long term.”

Fox News

Coronavirus (COVID-19)

Health Care

Bret Baier

Martha MacCallum

Social Security