Former President Donald Trump used to be able to rely on Fox News to have his back at all times, and vice versa.
Those days are long gone.
Earlier this week, Trump slammed Fox News in a post on his Truth Social platform for moving more to the middle. He even suggested that they remove a prominent member from its board.
As Trump wrote:
“Nobody can ever trust Fox News, and I am one of them, with the weak and ineffective RINO, Paul Ryan, on its Board of Directors. He’s a total lightweight, a failed and pathetic Speaker of the House, and a very disloyal person.
“[Utah Senator Mitt] Romney was bad, but Paul Ryan made him look worse. As a team, they never had a chance. Rupert and Lachlan, get that dog off your Board — You don’t need him. ALL YOU NEED IS TRUMP. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”
When Romney became the GOP nominee for president in 2012, Ryan served as his running mate. The two haven’t had the greatest of relationships in the past, and that only got worse recently when Ryan said he wouldn’t support Trump as he looked to return to the White House.
Speaking with Fox News recently, Ryan said the January 6 attack at the U.S. Capitol building, and the former president’s lack of character, were reasons why he wouldn’t be voting for the former president.
As Ryan said during that interview:
“I think it’s a contribution of factors. I think it really is just character at the end of the day, and the fact that if you’re willing to put yourself above the Constitution — an oath you swear when you take federal office, whether as president or as a member of Congress, you swear an oath to the Constitution — and you’re willing to suborn it to yourself, I think that makes you unfit for office.”
Like some others in the conservative party, Ryan placed blame for the recent lack of success at the polls that Republicans have experienced in Trump’s lap. As he suggested:
“Trump has cost us a lot of seats. He cost us the Senate twice, he cost us the House … because he is pushing through the prairies people who cannot win general elections, but who pledge fealty to him. Ever since 2016, we’ve been losing.”
Republicans have disappointed at the polls over the last few election cycles. Following Trump’s win in 2016, when the GOP had control of both chambers of Congress, the party suffered big losses in each of the next three major elections.
They first lost control of the House to Democrats in the 2018 midterms.
Then came the devastating 2020 election, when Trump lost the White House to President Joe Biden, and Democrats gained control of both the House and the Senate.
While Republicans won back the House in the 2022 midterms, they only did so by a very narrow margin. Plus, the prediction of a “red wave” where the GOP would win big majorities in both chambers never came to fruition, causing major disruptions within the party.
