A number of stories in the past few weeks point to corruption in President Donald Trump’s administration. But you wouldn’t know much about them from watching Fox News.
Pence and Doonbeg
During a recent trip to Ireland, Vice President Mike Pence stayed at Trump’s resort in Doonbeg even though his meetings were in Dublin, hours away from the resort. Pence’s chief of staff told the press that Trump suggested Pence could stay at the resort; Trump later claimed he had “nothing to do with” it. Pence has visited Trump properties multiple times in the past.
The news of Pence’s stay at Doonbeg broke September 2. A Media Matters review shows that Fox has mentioned the story just four times on since then, for a total of 2 minutes and 33 seconds. Two of those four mentions were on the afternoon of Saturday, September 7.
Military spending at Turnberry
On September 6, Politico reported about a letter from the House oversight committee regarding an Air National Guard crew rooming at Trump’s Turnberry resort in Scotland during a stop on its way to deliver supplies in Kuwait. Politico stated these incidents “raise the possibility that the military has helped keep Trump’s Turnberry resort afloat — the property lost $4.5 million in 2017, but revenue went up $3 million in 2018.” Politico subsequently reported on September 9 that Air Force crews have stayed at Trump’s resort at least four times since September 2018.
This Turnberry story has been covered on Fox News in three segments for a total of just 2 minutes and 3 seconds.
One minute and two seconds of that was on Justice with Judge Jeanine, during a segment in which host Jeanine Pirro and guest Dan Bongino complained about a tweet from Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) calling for Trump’s impeachment following the story. The details of the report were never mentioned and were only visible thanks to Fox’s screenshot of Ocasio-Cortez’s quote tweet of Politico reporter Natasha Bertrand.