Fox News cuts away from Kayleigh McEnany’s press conference

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Donald Trump has laid into Fox News saying it cost him the election, the same day host Neil Cavuto cut away from Kayleigh McEnany’s press conference over her baseless claims of ‘illegal voting’ and Sandra Smith was caught ridiculing a guest who questioned the validity of the result.  

The president accused Fox of ‘tampering with the election’ because its polls were ‘so inaccurate’ in a series of irate tweets Monday night where he threw the blame for his election defeat onto the media. 

This came the same day the network, which has long been a close ally of Trump’s, appeared to make its stance clear over his campaign’s repeated unsubstantiated claims that the election is ‘rigged’.  

Fox News’ host Cavuto cut away from Kayleigh McEnany’s press conference Monday afternoon saying he ‘can’t in good countenance continue showing this’ as she made a series of baseless claims that Democrats ‘welcome fraud and illegal voting’. 

Meanwhile, hours earlier anchor Sandra Smith was caught frowning and rolling her eyes and asking ‘what is happening’ as a Trump supporter repeated Trump’s accusations of widespread election fraud.  

This comes as Rupert Murdoch’s media empire appears to be seeking to distance itself from Trump, with Fox and several of its other conservative outlets switching their messaging in the days after the election much to Trump’s ire.  

Trump reeled off a barrage of tweets Monday accusing Fox and several other outlets of ‘election interference’ and ‘tampering’ with the election because their polls were ‘so far off’ in several states. 

He singled out Fox saying it was ‘wrong on everything’ adding to his increasingly fractured relationship with Fox News and Murdoch.

‘@FoxNews, @QuinnipiacPoll, ABC/WaPo, NBC/WSJ were so inaccurate with their polls on me, that it really is tampering with an Election. They were so far off in their polling, and in their attempt to suppress – that they should be called out for Election Interference,’ Trump blasted. 

He pointed to states including Wisconsin and Iowa where he said the media projected he would lose to Joe Biden. 

‘ABC/WaPo had me down 17 points in Wisconsin, the day before the election, and I WON! In Iowa, the polls had us 4 points down, and I won by 8.2%! Fox News and Quinnipiac were wrong on everything,’ he wrote.

‘The worst polling ever, and then they’ll be back in four years to do it again. This is much more then voter and campaign finance suppression!’ 

His Twitter rant came after Fox refused to air much of Enany’s press briefing Monday, breaking away from the president’s press secretary moments after she launched into a number of claims of election fraud – none of which have yet been backed up by evidence. 

McEnany kicked off her press conference insisting the election is ‘not over’ and that Republicans had ‘only begun the process of obtaining an accurate, honest vote count.’

She then launched into a string of unsubstantiated claims, including that the Democrats oppose voter ID laws, the verification of signatures, citizenship, residency and other identity markers, and that they had prevented Republican poll observers watching ballots being counted. 

‘You don’t take these positions because you want an honest election,’ McEnany said.

‘You take these positions because you are welcoming fraud and you are welcoming illegal voting.’

She continued saying ‘we want every legal vote to be counted and we want every illegal vote – ‘ before Neil Cavuto cut across her. 

‘Whoa, whoa, whoa. I just think we have to be very clear: she’s charging the other side as welcoming fraud and illegal voting, unless she has more details to back that up, I can’t in good countenance continue to show you this,’ Cavuto said.  

Cavuto said the network would return to the press conference if McEnany presented any evidence to back up the claims. 

‘But that’s an explosive charge to make, that the other side is effectively rigging and cheating, if she does bring proof of that of course we’ll take you back so far she has started saying, right at the outset, welcoming fraud, welcoming illegal voting,’ Cavuto said.  

‘Not so fast,’ he added.

Fox did not resume airing the press conference.   

When McEnany was later asked by a reporter for evidence of fraudulent votes, Trump’s press secretary was unable to present anything and asked for ‘patience’. 

‘What we are asking for right now is patience as we explore these equal protection claims among others,’ McEnany said. 

Cavuto’s refusal to give the baseless claims airtime comes the same day footage surfaced online of his colleague ridiculing a guest on the network who was questioning the election result.  

In a leaked clip circulating online, Smith – who was not on air at the time – pulls faces at the DC-based lawyer Cleta Mitchell’s comments and asks ‘what is happening’.  

‘I think everybody wants to know that this was done properly and legally and we can trust the results,’ said Cleta Mitchell, as she reiterated Trump’s claims of voter fraud, despite the president providing no evidence. 

 ‘And I think we have to look into every one of these concerns.

‘Remember, just because CNN says, or even Fox News says that somebody’s president doesn’t make them president,’ Mitchell told Fox News’ Trace Gallagher who was interviewing her.   

Smith is caught on camera rolling her eyes, furrowing her brow and shaking her head.

‘What?’ Smith said, looking up in disbelief and appearing to be unaware she was being picked up on a hot mic.

While Mitchell continues speaking, Smith then interjects in an angrier tone: ‘What is happening? Like, Trace, we’ve called it.’

Mitchell was either unable to hear Smith or chose to ignore her heckles, as she continued speaking. 

The video was first circulated on Twitter by political consultant, and former Daily Beast director of video, Timothy Burke.  

Smith, who first joined Fox Business Network as a reporter in October 2007, is a regular foil of White House spokespeople and has a back catalogue of viral clips showing her clashing with members of the Trump administration, including the likes of Kellyanne Conway.

Similarly, Cavuto has regularly questioned Trump hitting out at the president in May when he recommended taking hydroxychloroquine as a preventative for contracting COVID-19.  

Cavuto’s refusal to air McEnany’s press conference comes after seven television networks including CBS, ABC and NBC cut away from Trump’s White House address Thursday evening to fact check him with many calling out his ‘falsehoods’.

NBC cut the president off before the end of his speech, with host Lester Holt saying: ‘We have to interrupt here, because the president has made a number of false statements, including the notion that there has been fraudulent voting. There has been no evidence of that.’

Meanwhile CNN’s Jake Tapper called it a ‘sad night’ for Americans who had to hear the president ‘try to attack democracy that way with this feast of falsehoods.’

‘Lie after lie, after lie about the election being stolen. No evidence for what he’s saying, just smears about the integrity,’ he told viewers.

‘When he wins a state it’s legitimate, when he loses it’s because the vote is being stolen from him. It’s not true, it’s frankly pathetic.’

Fox, which has long been a close ally of the president, had been one of the few to air the president’s address in full that night. 

However its actions today come after the network and several other Rupert Murdoch-owned conservative outlets have changed their messaging in the days following the election. 

Murdoch and Trump have often rubbed shoulders in the same social circles and the media mogul’s right-wing networks have long sided with Trump.

But when Fox became the first outlet to call Arizona for Biden Tuesday night, Trump reportedly called Murdoch in a fury ‘to scream about the call and demand a retraction’, a source told Vanity Fair.

The 89-year-old media mogul refused to order his staff to retract the Arizona call.  

Several of Murdoch’s conservative outlets then changed their messaging as Trump’s chances of reelection slipped away in the days that followed, urging him to bow out with grace and all but declaring Biden the winner prior to the crucial state of Pennsylvania – and the election – being called.  

Fox News host Laura Ingraham sent a message to Trump to accept ‘the unfavorable outcome’ of the election with ‘grace and composure’ on her show Friday night.

Meanwhile, the front cover of Saturday’s edition of the New York Post – which last month exposed emails from Hunter Biden’s laptop and in October publicly endorsed Trump on its front cover – all but declared Biden’s victory hours before it was called. 

And the Wall Street Journal’s editorial board penned an opinion piece Friday warning Trump his ‘legacy will be diminished greatly if his final act is a bitter refusal to accept a legitimate defeat.’ 

Trump has refused to concede to Joe Biden and has made numerous unsubstantiated claims of fraud – despite presenting no evidence.   

The Trump campaign has said it will order a recount in Wisconsin, where Biden is up by 20,000 votes, and a recount is also likely in Georgia, where he is currently up by 10,000. 

It has also filed multiple lawsuits including the latest filed in Pennsylvania Monday  making its case to throw out more than 600,000 votes.