By DAVID BAUDER, Associated Press
NEW YORK (AP) — As Donald Trump’s two essential Republican rivals slugged it out Wednesday on a Iowa debate stage, the previous president appeared throughout city on a Fox News Channel city corridor in a counterprogramming transfer the place few discouraging phrases have been heard.
Trump walked onstage to cheers and chants of “USA,” stayed on the finish to signal autographs and heard one viewers member blurt out “love you” after he took her query.
He was barely challenged by questioners who left a number of difficult subjects on the desk — like Trump’s false claims in regards to the 2020 election, his help for Capitol insurrectionists and authorized arguments this week by which his attorneys claimed he had immunity from any potential crimes he may need carried out whereas in workplace.
When requested about his earlier statements {that a} second time period as president can be about retribution for his enemies, Trump mentioned he wouldn’t have time for it.
“The ultimate retribution,” he mentioned, “is success.”
It was Trump’s first reside look on Fox News since 2022, and the way the community dealt with it was carefully watched. It got here lower than a yr after Fox agreed to pay Dominion Voting Systems $787 million to settle a lawsuit associated to lies informed within the aftermath of the 2020 election.
Fox instituted a comfortable ban in opposition to Trump within the opening days of the Biden administration, and the previous president has complained about a few of its personalities being insufficiently loyal to him.
His standing atop 2024 presidential polls, nevertheless, put him ready of power. While Fox held Iowa city halls with Ron DeSantis and Nikki Haley outdoors of prime-time hours up to now week, Trump demanded that his city corridor air in direct competitors with the CNN debate between his two rivals.
Moderators Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum had their very own problem: to not enable the city corridor to go off the rails, as the same city corridor televised by CNN final May did, whereas additionally not alienating a community viewers crammed with Trump supporters.
They did it by not interrupting Trump with fact-checks. After Trump criticized how DeSantis responded to COVID as governor of Florida, MacCallum mentioned, “DeSantis would argue with your characterization.” During an abortion dialogue, when Trump instructed “radical” Democrats supported killing infants after they have been born, it was not challenged.
The occasion stood in distinction to sharp questioning by CNN’s debate moderators, who put each candidates on the protection at factors and revealed some coverage variations between Haley and DeSantis.
Baier requested Trump whether or not he might say that political violence is rarely acceptable. The former president mentioned, “Of course, that’s right,” however then mentioned that President Joe Biden “is bedlam.”
His courtroom fights got here up when MacCallum requested how he’d reply to a DeSantis assertion a couple of potential Trump basic election marketing campaign being primarily left as much as a jury in a Washington, D.C., courtroom.
“It’s a witch hunt,” Trump mentioned.
He was interrupted a number of instances by applause and even laughter — like when he mentioned about former rival Chris Christie, who was caught on a sizzling mic Wednesday saying that Haley was going to get “smoked” within the voting, that it was “one of the few things he’s been right about.”
The majority of questioners mentioned they have been Trump supporters, together with one anticipated caucusgoer who returned to the previous president after attending one of many different candidate city halls, saying she had been undecided.
One man, who mentioned he was a Trump supporter, mentioned a few of his associates had turned away from the previous president as a result of they feared “four years of chaos due to your haters.”
Trump — and the viewers — backed that characterization.
“Most of the chaos was caused by Democrats constantly going after me,” he mentioned, to the viewers’s applause.
For Trump, the looks capped off a pre-primary season the place he refused to seem at any debates that includes his rivals.
Source: www.bostonherald.com”