Laura Loomer and Donald Trump
Andrea Austria / Media Matters

Research/Study Research/Study

Fox News is completely ignoring Trump's relationship with conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer

None of Fox's programs have mentioned Loomer or Trump's relationship with her

Written by Harrison Ray

Published

Fox News has completely ignored various stories related to notorious bigot Laura Loomer and her relationship with former President Donald Trump this week, even as her proximity to and influence on the Republican presidential nominee came under increasing scrutiny. 

  • Loomer and the former president reportedly spent much of the past week together. Trump apparently first brought Loomer to the September 10 presidential debate in Philadelphia, taking her with him on his private plane. The next day, Trump and Loomer — who is a 9/11 conspiracy theorist — attended two 9/11 remembrance ceremonies together in New York and Pennsylvania. She then spent much of Wednesday posting on social media, stirring up a feud with fellow 9/11 conspiracy theorist, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA).

    Loomer has a history of spreading racism, bigotry, and conspiracy theories, including sharing a video that claimed “9/11 was an Inside Job!” 

    The Trump campaign declined a request for comment from NBC on the details of the decision to attend the events with Loomer.

  • Media Matters reviewed programming on Fox News from September 10, when it was reported that Loomer traveled on the former president's plane to Pennsylvania, through September 13 at 1 P.M. EST, and found that the network completely ignored Loomer and her relationship with the Republican nominee for president. The stories about Loomer have garnered significant attention from other major media outlets.

  • Fox News' failure to adequately inform its audience about Trump's relationship with an extremist is no surprise; the network regularly sanitizes or ignores negative stories about the former president.

  • Methodology

  • Media Matters searched transcripts in the SnapStream video database for all original programming on Fox News Channel for the term “Loomer,” including any misspellings, from September 10, 2024, when far-right activist Laura Loomer was pictured departing GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump's plane before the first debate, through 1 P.M. EST on September 13, 2024.

    We included claims, which we defined as instances of uninterrupted blocks of speech from a single speaker. For host monologues, correspondent reports, and headlines, we defined a claim as the speech between read quotes and played clips. We did not consider the speech within the read quote or played clip unless a speaker in the segment positively affirmed said speech directly before or after the quote was read or the clip was played.

    We then reviewed the video and transcripts for claims that mentioned Laura Loomer in any capacity.