The talk was taxes, testosterone and rage when Fox News commentators covered the DNC
CHICAGO — While Democrats celebrated with abandon Thursday over the elevation of Vice President Kamala Harris as the party’s presidential nominee, viewers of Fox News received a prolonged disquisition on the many dire shortcomings of the candidate and her party.
Even before Harris took the stage at the United Center, the channel’s star prime-time commentators Jesse Watters, Sean Hannity and their guests, headlined by former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, belittled the vice president as unqualified, unserious and a threat to the American way.
The messaging came as no surprise to regular viewers of the most influential conservative news outlet, which delivered long blocks of commentary throughout the Democratic National Convention, seldom showing the people or performances onstage in Chicago.
Viewers were told that Harris and running mate Tim Walz, the Minnesota governor, would put capitalism and American values in imminent peril, opening the nation to invading hordes of immigrants and leftist economic policy that would turn the U.S. into another Venezuela.
Gingrich took a swipe at Walz, suggesting he wasn’t what he appeared to be and “was never actually a coach.”
The barb had been tossed out earlier by former President Trump via his Truth Social platform, with the Republican noting that Walz had been an assistant coach, not a head coach, for the football team at Mankato West High School. (Such parsing probably wouldn’t please about a dozen members of Walz’s team who reunited on the convention stage to support Walz on Wednesday night and sang his praises in multiple interviews.)
The Fox crew lit into the Democrats not just with spoken words, but also with on-screen headlines and disquieting video. Consider the chyrons that leaped onto the screen as Watters, then Hannity and Gingrich, chatted: “Dems Ditch Policy, Go All In on Emotion”; “When Will Kamala Do an Interview?”; “Kamala Has Never Cared About the Border”; “Vetting the Extreme Harris-Walz Agenda”; and “DNC Repackages Kamala as the ‘Female Obama.’”
In a series of real-time posts on his social media site, former President Trump lashed out at Kamala Harris as she formally accepted Democrats’ nomination for president.
Hannity, Fox’s longtime prime-time personality, assured viewers that the Democratic claims of promoting a more joyful public square amounted to a ruse. As Hannity spoke, the message ”Feel the Rage” flashed on the screen, while Fox also rolled video of protesters burning American flags and immigrants wading into a river to cross into the U.S.
“I mean, there’s joy in people smiling and playing music,” fumed Hannity, a close friend and ally of Trump, “but a lot of rage on that stage. Not a lot about how they’re going to fix America’s problems: inflation, the border, energy, America’s place in the world, law and order. I don’t hear a lot about that at all.”
Hannity’s hour also featured a segment with a Fox reporter covering pro-Palestinian protests in the streets outside the United Center.
Chicago police and most observers noted that the widespread unrest that had been predicted by some did not occur, and the planned protests failed to draw the tens of thousands of demonstrators that organizers had hoped for. The vast majority of those who came to Chicago marched peacefully.
Fox’s reporter noted that the marchers had been following the prescribed parade route. The group assembled around him was quiet, standing and holding placards, including some that criticized Harris.
“They say, if people are still dying in Gaza, there won’t be any business as usual,” the reporter said. “So they’re not going to shy away from things like vandalism, disruption, escalation, as they call it.” Despite that prediction, the streets remained mostly quiet.
Back in the studio, Gingrich said that a recent speech by Harris on economics “was so far to the left of [Sen.] Bernie Sanders that Gorbachev and Russia would [have] thought it was a radical speech.”
Hannity and Gingrich agreed that the Democrat’s proposed tax on some unrealized capital gains — on real estate or money invested in the stock market — could lead to everyday Americans losing their savings or even their homes.
The problem with the assertions was that they badly mischaracterized the Harris plan, which calls for increased taxes only on those with incomes of more than $400,000 a year. The tax on unrealized capital gains is designed to hit a much higher tax bracket, according to an analysis by the New York Times.
The salvo foreshadowed what’s expected to become a pattern in the final weeks of the presidential race — a series of charges and counter charges about which party’s tax plan will favor average Americans.
The Fox commentators’ beatdown of the Democratic tax plan raised an incongruity: Much of the network’s commentary in recent days had been about how Harris and Walz had not put forward specific proposals. While Hannity continued to stoke that claim, he also battered the quite specific tax plan. And he portrayed the Democrats as extreme leftists.
“Every once in a while, the mask comes off and you realize you’re dealing with someone who’s crazy,” Hannity said, apparently referring to Harris and her tax plan. “And, of course, with Walz, you have the most radical governor in the country, far to the left of Bernie Sanders, and you have with Harris, a San Francisco radical.”
Appearing before Hannity and Harris’ speech, Watters leaned into some of the culture war issues Republicans have employed against Democrats.
After a segue in which he and Fox host Martha MacCallum discussed how hard they had worked out that day and how strong Hannity was in the gym, Watters showed video of CNN commentator Dana Bash praising Walz and Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff, Harris’ husband, for a new brand of masculinity that allows for sensitivity and strength.
Watters used that video as an intro to asking former Democratic House member Harold Ford Jr., a regular Fox contributor, how he felt about the party’s framing of masculinity: “Harold, how embarrassed are you as a Democrat that you guys are now pandering to the low-testosterone men?”
Ford ignored the question and discussed what he thought Harris should do in her speech to show Americans that she is presidential and represents the mainstream of the nation’s politics. Smiling, Watters persisted: “Harold, how embarrassed are you? Your party’s a bunch of low-T guys?”
Kamala Harris’ identity may be the fulcrum on which the 2024 presidential election turns.
MacCallum, joining the segment, painted Democrats as too young, gullible or otherwise unaware to understand the shortcomings of the Democrats. “That’s where I think you get those older voters,” McCallum said, “and maybe some white male voters who are not so easily persuaded by feelings and [being] emotional, joyful.”
Watters, who began his Fox career as a smiling and acerbic sidekick to Bill O’Reilly, got in a shot at one other Democrat — California Gov. Gavin Newsom. He suggested that Newsom had not been given a speaking role (outside of announcing the votes of the state delegation) out of Harris’ spite. “He’s being punished,” Watters said. “You can’t be overly ambitious if you’re a man.”
The tone of Fox’s coverage shifted markedly once Harris took the stage and in the follow-up panel discussion.
The cable outlet stuck with the entire 37-minute address and then provided relatively balanced analysis afterward. Fox prime-time anchor Bret Baier and panelists, including Ford, said Harris’ performance was strong.
“It was a forceful speech delivered very crisply, very professionally, with emphasis. There was no stumbling, fumbling, or any of that,” said Brit Hume, a Fox News veteran.
Dana Perino, White House press secretary under President George W. Bush, said Harris’ tough talk on defense and support of Israel were the strongest parts of her address.
But Perino also said Harris had not yet faced tough questions. And she pushed back on Harris’ charge that Trump would invoke Project 2025, a proposal to radically transform the federal government whose authors included many Trump allies and former aides, but which the former president has disavowed.
Get the L.A. Times Politics newsletter
Deeply reported insights into legislation, politics and policy from Sacramento, Washington and beyond. In your inbox three times per week.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
