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Donald Trump Jr. has said he was warned by insiders at Fox News that network bosses were not happy with his criticism following the sudden firing of top-rated host Tucker Carlson in late April.
The former president’s oldest son says he was told to “expect retaliation” after ripping the firing as unwise and accusing top executives of “censorship.” He went on to say that he also has not been invited onto the network in nearly nine months, the report noted.
“I’ve been watching the censorship happening even in conservative mainstream media,” Don Jr. said on the Steak for Breakfast podcast. “I mean, you saw what sort of Fox did to Tucker Carlson, last week, and the week before that, it was Dan Bongino and, you know, the people who would actually question some of that narrative.”
“I’ve been sort of outspoken at America First [network] and I used to be on Fox 3, 4, 5, 6, 10 times a week. I haven’t been on in nine months. Not a call, not an invite, not anything. And so I understand what it, what it appears like they’re trying to do to the America First movement. You know, Tucker was another one of those voices,” Trump Jr. noted further, according to Mediaite.
Recently he posted to Twitter: “Have heard from a few of my friends at Fox News that the leftist executives running things there are pissed at me for calling them out over firing Tucker and to ‘expect retaliation.’ A lot of good people still work at Fox, but their RINO leadership is at war with conservatives!”
The former president’s son could have been referencing former House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), who took a position on the network’s board of directors after he left Congress and was reportedly involved in a decision to “move on” from then-President Trump in the wake of his allegations that the 2020 election was “rigged” against him, per a court document that was leaked to The New York Times last month pertaining to Fox’s recent bombshell settlement with Dominion Voting Systems.
Reports regarding the leaked document came just days after the two parties reached an agreement in which Fox News agreed to pay a record $787.5 to Dominion for defamation, though the agreement did not include the network having to apologize to the voting election software firm.
Meanwhile, Fox’s ratings have taken a huge hit since Carlson was taken off the air, including legacy shows like “Hannity.”
Sean Hannity’s show, which got up to 1.9 million last week, fell to a 1.3 million average this week. Hannity’s total viewers dropped by roughly 600,000 to 1.3 million.
“Fox fired Carlson, its most-watched on-air presence, last month following a steady string of controversies and dwindling participation in his primetime show by premium advertisers. Fox News’ rating performance declined around 50% in the key adults 25-54 audience demo in the immediate aftermath of Carlson’s final April 21 show,” AdWeek reported.
Despite the fallout from ousting Carlson in April, Fox News remained the most-watched network in all of cable news in May. “The Five” was the highest-rated show on cable news with 2.6 million average total viewers and 267,000 average demo viewers.
“Fox News, in the first full month since firing Tucker Carlson, brought in 1.42 million viewers in primetime – a 37% drop year over year. CNN’s total prime-time viewership sank to 494,000 viewers, a 25% year-over-year decrease. MSNBC, on the other hand, averaged 1.16 million prime-time viewers for a 14% percent gain compared to last year. For comparison, Fox averaged 2.09 million total prime-time viewers in the first quarter of the year, while CNN averaged 568,000 viewers and MSNBC had 1.11 million average viewers,” Mediaite reported.
“Fox News still swept the competition, marking its 27th straight month beating both MSNBC and CNN in total day and prime-time viewers,” the report added.
