Fox calls Biden a “wannabe dictator” during the broadcast of a Trump speech | International

"Would-be dictator speaks in White House after having his political rival arrested," the banner read on Tuesday night's conservative Fox News broadcast. The phrase, which has sparked controversy in the United States, accompanied an image split in half. On the left, President Joe Biden, the “wannabe dictator” the sign did not specifically mention. On the right, Donald Trump, the "political rival" arrested.

The text aired on the 8:00 p.m. program Fox News Tonight, territory until his firing in April of the network's star, Tucker Carlson, at the end of a certainly intense day for news networks in the United States, which They followed Trump's appearance before a Miami court minute by minute. There he pleaded "not guilty" to the 37 charges of which he is charged for the alleged commission of seven federal crimes for his management of the papers he took out of the White House after ceasing to be president and retained without permission in his mansion in Mar-a-Lago, despite the fact that by law they belong to the National Archives.

EL PAÍS tried at the end of Wednesday morning to obtain the opinion of the conservative chain, but did not receive an immediate response. political information website The Hill received the following explanation: "The sign was removed immediately and we opened an investigation into what happened."

Fox was the only one of the big stations that decided to broadcast the speech that the former president gave to a group of donors at another of the tycoon's residences, in Bedminster (New Jersey), after leaving Miami (Florida), in his private plane. His appearance was full of lies and false accusations.

Biden was at that time participating in an act at the White House on the occasion of the celebration, next Monday, of Juneteenth, a federal holiday that commemorates the end of slavery in the United States. He was asked by reporters in the afternoon if he wanted to comment on the news about the impeachment of his predecessor in office and, for now, according to voting intention polls for the Republican nomination, his most likely challenger in the 2024 election. No," the president replied.

Both Biden and the attorney general, Merrick Garland, are trying by all means to distance themselves from the case of the Mar-a-Lago papers, to avoid suspicions of a "witch hunt" or "impeachment" that they agitate without You prove the former president.

Fox News' relationship with Trump has evolved like a roller coaster since, after election night in 2020, its newsroom was the first to award Biden the win in Arizona. Trump continues to claim without evidence that there was massive fraud then, and that he was robbed at the polls. The conservative chain maintained this hoax despite the fact that, as demonstrated in the summary of the case that was born with a complaint from the Dominion electoral machine company, its journalists knew for sure that it was just that, a hoax. The matter was buried before reaching the courts, after a payment of 787.5 million dollars (725 million euros), authorized to avoid further problems for Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch, owners of News Corp.

Criticism for supporting DeSantis

Trump has been attacking Fox News for months over its support for the presidential aspirations of his great enemy at home, Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis. The station made decisions that were unthinkable until then, such as not broadcasting Trump's announcement in November that he planned to run for the White House for the third time. It was perhaps his lowest moment, when he seemed definitely subscribed to the image, so toxic in the United States, of the loser. Things have changed a lot since then: at this point, his options to obtain the designation of his party —whose figure continues to dominate, in the same way that seven years ago he took over the conservative movement in the country— they look more robust than ever. .

He has warned that he remains in the campaign despite the two accusations that he accumulates (the other, in New York, for an alleged payment to the porn actress Stormy Daniels to bury an extramarital affair between the two, which he denies).

The other major news stations chose to carry the content of his speech on Tuesday night. a posteriori to avoid spreading without filter the messages that Trump released during his appearance. Lies such as that he had "every right to have those documents." This attitude of the press seems to indicate that they learned some lessons from their coverage of the rising star of the Republican Party who ended up winning the elections in 2016 against almost all odds.

That stance was summed up in a tweet by MSNBC journalist Kyle Griffin sent during the New Jersey speech: “Donald Trump is lying non-stop in his statements. It's all you need to know about them."

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