Fox Trump Bromance Is Back On, Hannity Interviews Him, Not DeSantis

Are we going to get whiplash from watching the going back and forth, back and forth, of Fox News and Donald Trump? I already feel like I’m a spectator in some insane tennis game from Hell, seated on the back of a Pushmi Pullyou. I’m already exhausted and it’s a long long way to the caucuses of January, 2024.

You know all about the New York Post castigating Trump in its recent op/ed. The bottom line of that was that Trump cannot win and the GOP cannot afford to stay with him.

That was Friday night. Now it’s Sunday and we’re looking forward to tomorrow’s TV lineup and lo and behold, guess who’s scheduled in prime time with Sean Hannity Monday night? The Hill:

Trump’s planned appearance on Fox — which briefly experienced a dip in ratings following the 2020 election, though they have since rebounded — would be his first on the network since he announced his bid for the Republican nomination in 2024.

It also comes amid revelations through the Dominion Voting Systems lawsuit against the network that Fox’s top leaders and hosts privately complained about Trump and his false statements about the election even as many voiced support for him on the air.

“We are very very close to being able to ignore Trump most nights. I truly can’t wait,” Tucker Carlson, one of Fox’s top-rated hosts, wrote in one widely publicized text message to an unidentified Fox employee on January 4, 2021, according to one court filing.

“I hate him passionately,” Carlson wrote in another message.

Really? Well, Tucker must be a man of fleeting passions because it turns out that he walked back all that and now his tune is

“Oh, let’s see. I spent four years defending his policies and I — I’m going to defend them again tonight,” Carlson said. “And actually, and I’m pretty straightforward, I’m, um, I love Trump. Like, as a person, I think Trump is funny and insightful.”

We know that money trumps integrity. That’s a no brainer. We know that Tucker and Laura and Sean will say whatever they need to say so that those epic $30 million a year salaries are paid. We’ll all quite clear on that.

What is muddy and incomprehensible, is the Murdoch media empire now some kind of an octopus and one tentacle doesn’t know what the other is doing? That’s how it appears. Trump was mud a few days go, now he’s taking the catbird position on Fox News the weekend after his kick off rally in Waco.

Whatever happened to Fox News and “DeFuture of the GOP” aka Ron? Where’s Ron in all this?

This could get comical. Right now I see DeSantis as the mistress who has been assured that the divorce is going through and she believes it, because she knows that her lover really hates his wife. Murdoch may very well hate Trump. He obviously sees Trump as somebody who cannot win in 2024, or at least that’s the trial balloon he decided to float and let the collective journalists of the editorial board take the hit. Nobody knows who they are anyway.

So what is Murdoch’s plan? To get back in bed with Trump and kick DeSantis to the curb?

Or, is Murdoch going to try to ride some insane middle ground and that never works. Again, just ask DeSantis. DeSantis has tried to remain true to Trump, so as not to alienate the MAGA base, and yet also present himself as a new and better candidate. It hasn’t worked. All that has happened is that DeSantis looks inconsistent and stupid and his polls are dipping.

There’s only a couple of sure things you can say here: 1) Fox News is ruled by the vocal minority of die hard Trump fans. These are the deadheads that show up at all the rallies, buy the merchandise, do the small dollar donations. Fox News is positively transfixed by these people.

2) Fox News wants the GOP in power. Of course it does. It is and always has been, the mouthpiece of the GOP, since its inception.

So does Murdoch now believe, after the scathing New York Post editorial, that the MAGA base is so much larger than it is, or that the moderate Republicans are going to now embrace Trump and he does, in fact, have a chance at winning?

Or, maybe Murdoch knows Trump can’t win but it’s his best shot for ratings and money while the inevitable plays out? That frankly would not surprise me. It would not surprise me if the powers that be met in a dim room, smoke-filled or not, this weekend and hashed through their options. Maybe they realize that they’re stuck with Trump and they’re hoping to run DeSantis in 2028 now. And is it logical to assume that Trump won’t try to run again in 2028 if he’s defeated in 2024?

In any event, it looks like the Fox Trump bromance is back on. Any way you cut it.