President Donald Trump blasted Fox News yesterday for simply reporting various polls showing him falling farther behind with voters across the country. Trump complained that “something weird going on at Fox.” This follows the firing of Trump pollsters (including long-standing campaign aides) after poll results were leaked showing Trump behind Biden in various key states. Trump denied any such polls existed and denounced the stories as “fake news”, but later the White House admitted that they did exist. There is nothing weird going on. Just reporting.
Fox News on Sunday released a new poll that showed Trump losing to various Democratic presidential candidates. Bernie Sanders was shown with a nine point lead. That tracks a number of polls, including the internal White House polls. A Quinnipiac poll released last week also showed Trump trailing a number of Democratic contenders, including Biden by 13 points.
Trump has reacted angrily to such polls and suggested that it was “weird” for Fox to report polling that showed him losing ground in key states. He also took time to contest the extract amount of time spent with ABC:
Polls are always bad for me. They were against Crooked Hillary also. Something weird going on at Fox. Our polls show us leading in all 17 Swing States. For the record, I didn’t spend 30 hours with @abcnews, but rather a tiny fraction of that. More Fake News @BretBaier23.2K7:49 PM – Jun 17, 2019
I have spoken with members of Congress who are worried that Trump does not recognize that his approach is alienating key voters in the general election. The constant badgering of the media and others may play well with his base but 52 percent of voters now say that they are “very uncomfortable” voting for him. That is with a strong economy. What is strange is that the White House continues to step on its own lines, undermine its strongest claims, and push independents away with continual controversial tweets and missteps.
I have great respect for many people at Fox. Indeed, some of the toughest interviews faced by Trump have occurred with Fox hosts like Chris Wallace. Martha McCallum, and Bret Baier. Rather than acknowledge that Fox is the least hostile to Trump, these comments are deeply insulting to journalists who seek to inform their viewers on the current polling and trends in the election.
Yet, Trump has even objected to Fox holding town hall events with opposing candidates as in May when Trump denounced Fox for “wasting airtime” and warned that “Fox is moving more and more to the losing (wrong) side in covering the Dems. They forgot the people who got them there.”