Donald Trump has lost a key media ally for his third presidential bid, and he hasn’t even announced he’s running in 2024 yet.
After the GOP’s lackluster performance in the 2022 midterms, plenty of Republicans are now turning on the twice-impeached former president. With tangible proof that his MAGA base just didn’t show up at the polls the way so many pundits expected, even Trump’s staunchest supporters are now jumping ship, looking to rivals like Florida Governor Ron DeSantis to fill their ticket in two years’ time. But the latest conservative power player abandoning the real estate tycoon might just represent the final nail in Trump’s political coffin.
Rupert Murdoch, the media magnate who owns everything from Fox News to the New York Post and the Wall Street Journal, has told Trump, in no uncertain terms, that he won’t be backing him in any upcoming elections. Murdoch, who was instrumental to the success of Trump’s 2016 campaign, has even gone so far as to suggest that he would ensure that his papers and news channels favored a Democratic candidate against Trump if the Mar-a-Lago retiree planned to run in 2024.
There have been conversations between them during which Rupert made it clear to Donald that we cannot back another run for the White House,” a senior News Corp source told journalist David Parsley, via Mediaite.
According to this latest report, Murdoch promised that his coverage would “remain neutral” should President Joe Biden decide to go for a second term and run against Trump.
“If it turns out to be Donald versus Joe then it may be that we just cover the race without any leanings one way or the other,” the source said. But, if Democrats put forth a new, more promising candidate, and Trump still decided to run, then Murdoch plans to support the Democratic ticket “for the sake of stability and a sensible White House.”
“A lot of things would have to fall into place for that to happen. Joe would not be running, and the Democrats would have to have a new strong candidate,” the source explained.
No matter what Dems decide to do, it sounds like Trump has lost the support of the Murdoch empire. Rupert Murdoch’s son, Lachlan Murdoch, heavily favors DeSantis and hopes to see him run in 2024, which might be why recent Fox News segments see the Florida governor enjoying plenty of positive coverage. In fact, a recent episode of Harris Faulkner’s show presented a lineup of potential 2024 presidential candidates for the GOP, and Trump was noticeably missing from that roster.
interesting — Harris Faulker on her Fox News show showed a graphic of 13 potential Republican presidential candidates and Trump wasn't among them pic.twitter.com/wdhF4OSSZY
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) November 15, 2022
Seeing as how Trump is obsessed with how he’s represented in the media, we have to think this latest betrayal really stings.
(Via Mediaite)