Fox News’ Sean Hannity admitted that “hatred” towards Donald Trump was a key reason for the GOP’s devastating midterm losses.
Speaking on the network on Tuesday night as Democrats were seizing control of the House and Senate, the longtime Trump ally desperately tried to suggest that some of the president’s economic policies had been successful, and that voter backlash to his war on Iran might not have been so intense if there had not been so much “ping-ponging.”
“Either go in, kill it, or back off, and that’s the end of it. We stopped them. If we see them again, we’ll go in again. Maybe there was too much back-and-forth,” Hannity said of the deeply unpopular Middle East conflict, which has sent gas and oil prices soaring.
“I’m going to add one other factor here. Hatred is a hell of a motivator, and Jesse [Watters] is not wrong in saying he wasn’t on the ballot. You can say you were on the ballot all you want. He was not on the ballot this year.”
Harold Ford Jr., a former congressman turned Fox News contributor, then asked whether backlash to Trump’s second term had “inspired” more Democrats to turn out during this midterm cycle.
“Oh, I think, I think the hatred for this man is unprecedented. I’ve never seen anything like it,” Hannity said.
Fellow Fox News panelist Brit Hume wondered whether Trump had made a mistake by putting himself front and center of the GOP’s midterm strategy—including telling people to “pretend” he was on the ballot—given his dire approval ratings.
“He was warned by everybody around him what historical trends were, and he wanted to roll the dice because he wanted to try,” Hannity replied.
Laura Ingraham then suggested that the backlash to the war in Iran, which has dragged on for more than eight months with no end in sight, ultimately doomed the president and the GOP to a midterm massacre.
“People just don’t like war, they do not want to go to war,” she said. “And if it’s a choice between cheap gas and war, people say cheap gas every time.”
Host Bret Baier had to interrupt Ingraham so Fox News could call the South Carolina Senate election for Democrat Annie Andrews over Republican Sen. Darline Graham—one of a string of seats Democrats flipped to win control of the upper chamber.
Trump faced criticism for nominating Graham, a political novice, to fill the seat vacated by her late brother, Lindsey Graham, following his death in July.
On Tuesday night, Trump tried to blame Fox News, normally his favorite news network, for the disastrous election results.
“FoxNews Ratings are way down (27%!) because they’re spending too much time covering the Trump Deranged Dumocrats!” he posted on Truth Social. “All of those people who used to watch Fox, and no longer do, get it. It’s them, not me—My numbers are better than they have ever been.”
