Fox News host Laura Ingraham recently interrupted former President Donald Trump at a town hall in Greenville, South Carolina on Tuesday when he began discussing the 2020 election.
“The way you win is by swamping them,” Trump said of his election strategy in 2024. “And we’re gonna swamp. I’ll tell you what. I did great in the first election. I did much better in the second election, I hate to tell you.”
Ingraham interrupted. “We have some interesting news coming out of New York, by the way,” she said, teasing an unfavorable poll for President Joe Biden. “A New York poll that just came out, which we’re gonna get to. But Mr. President, Kelly is in the audience and has a question about foreign aid.”
Trump erroneously claims that there was a rigged election in 2020 against him. Following their defeat, Trump, along with a number of Fox News guests and presenters, propagated irrational and occasionally insane conspiracy theories regarding widespread electoral fraud. One story claims that Dominion Voting Systems’ voting equipment were used to rig the election in Biden’s advantage. In April 2021, Dominion settled a slander lawsuit against Fox for $787.5 million.
The network has been hurt by the litigation, as many of its personal problems were revealed in court documents. Numerous Fox hosts’ and other staff members’ correspondence suggested that they did not think Trump’s exaggerated statements were true. However, they felt compelled to “respect” Fox viewers by giving them inaccurate information they wanted to hear.
“Respecting this audience whether we agree or not is critical,” host Sean Hannity texted a producer in November 2020.
Ingraham has repeatedly urged Trump not to re-litigate the 2020 election. “[P]lease, for the love of God, stop talking about 2020,” she said in July.
The host has also been quick to shut down others who make claims about the election. In August, John Eastman declared on her show that he “had lots of evidence of fraud.”
“I haven’t seen that evidence,” she said. The audio and visuals suggested Eastman – a lawyer who told Trump that Vice President Mike Pence could overturn the election – made remarks that appeared to be edited out of the pre-taped interview.
