Fox News hosts seek causes for GOP defeat while sparing Trump
Right-wing commentators cite the Iran war and trade policy for the Republican loss, but avoid blaming the president directly, instead targeting staff and Democratic opponents.
By Matthew Collins ·
The Republican Party suffered a crushing defeat in the midterm elections, yet the most popular conservative television shows have not offered the same level of denial seen after the 2020 presidential race. Instead, hosts and analysts on Wednesday evening expressed deep disbelief about the results while carefully avoiding direct criticism of President Donald Trump.
Jesse Watters of Fox News opened his show with a banner asking, "HOW DID THIS HAPPEN?" He argued that the election turned on the Iran war and the trade war, describing the combination as a two-punch blow to the party. Watters also cited corruption and the recent release of the Epstein files as key motivators for voters, noting that the documents left a bad taste in people's mouths.
While Watters identified these external factors, he did not examine the president's personal responsibility for the strategic decisions that led to those conflicts. This pattern of careful language has become common across right-wing media, where hosts handle the president's ego with caution to avoid angering his loyal viewer base.
Ben Shapiro, a prominent podcaster, offered one of the more direct assessments on Wednesday. He praised Trump for being totally impervious to criticism but warned that there is a thin line between ignoring bad feedback and being out of touch with reality. Laura Ingraham of Fox News agreed with the assessment of voter sentiment, stating that Americans want prices to drop and peace to return. She emphasized that voters hate war, especially when it leads to higher costs.
After acknowledging the scale of the GOP loss, many programs pivoted to criticizing newly elected Democrats. Hosts on The Five used colorful insults, referring to new senators James Talarico and Abdul El-Sayed as commies and crazy people. Watters struggled to wrap his head around the idea that voters chose those candidates, calling them Tala-freak-o and Abdul bluh-bluh-bluh.
Other analysts have placed the blame squarely on the president, but MAGA media often defaults to the idea that Trump can only be wronged by those around him. Blaine Holt, a retired Air Force brigadier general, told Newsmax that the GOP failed to follow the president's leadership. Emily Compagno of Fox News blamed unproductive Republican lawmakers for failing to use their majority in Congress over the past two years.
Some hosts took the blame further down the chain of command. Caroline Sunshine, a guest on Watters' show, argued that White House chief of staff Susie Wiles needs to resign because her campaign skills did not translate to governing. Steve Deace, a radio host, wrote on social media that the staff members who sent the president to a construction site photo op the day after the loss should be fired and perhaps put in prison.
Sean Hannity of Fox News, whose recent wedding rehearsal dinner at Mar-a-Lago was attended by Trump, urged the party to stop finger-pointing. His new bride, Ainsley Earhardt, dismissed the results as normal for a midterm election, despite experts noting this was the worst performance in decades. Both hosts maintained that Democrats would soon overreach and cause buyer's remorse among voters.
Tucker Carlson, a former Fox host who has become a vocal critic of Trump, offered a contrasting view on his podcast. He called the defeat a necessary reckoning for the party and spent more than an hour analyzing the results. Carlson declared that the end of the Trump era had arrived, a sentiment that has been largely absent from the main networks on Wednesday night.
