Nineteen … and counting.
That’s the number of former Fox News hosts, commentators, on-air medical experts, producers and other personnel who are poised to occupy roles in the second administration of President-elect Donald J. Trump.
Never before has a single media organization exported so many alumni to a president’s day-one cabinet and staff. And while Mr. Trump also recruited TV types for roles in his first term, he is now seeking to put pundits like Pete Hegseth, his nominee for defense secretary, in charge of entire government agencies.
All of which augurs a new twist in the tempestuous relationship between Mr. Trump and Fox News, the Rupert Murdoch-controlled network that has been perhaps his most powerful booster in the media world, but also frequently the focus of his ire. Now Fox News correspondents at the White House, the Pentagon and elsewhere in government will be reporting on an administration populated by many of their former colleagues.
Star hosts like Sean Hannity and Jesse Watters can be expected to lionize Mr. Trump and the Fox alumni joining him in Washington. The situation is more delicate for Fox reporters like Jennifer Griffin, the network’s chief national security correspondent, who will be responsible for covering a Pentagon under Mr. Hegseth’s purview. That’s also the case for Peter Doocy, the White House correspondent who relished needling President Biden and his aides, and will now be scrutinized for his handling of Mr. Trump.
Jay Wallace, the president and executive editor of Fox News Media, who runs the channel’s newsroom, said in an interview that “this is business as usual.”
“When push comes to shove, we will want answers to our questions on the issues of the day,” Mr. Wallace said. “We don’t view this coverage any differently than any other administration we’ve pressed for answers over the last 28 years.”
Mr. Wallace allowed that Mr. Doocy may downshift to a less adversarial style, but he attributed any changes to Mr. Trump’s relative openness with the media.
Mr. Doocy often had to “throw some bait out there” to persuade Mr. Biden to engage, Mr. Wallace said. Under Mr. Trump, “it may not be the exact same shouting, casting a line or forcing the president to turn around. But at its core, he’ll be looking for the same answers he would get from Biden.”
On Jan. 7, Mr. Trump dined at Mar-a-Lago with Mr. Wallace and Suzanne Scott, the chief executive of Fox News Media. The meeting was off the record and the participants declined to comment.
Other network news leaders have flown to Florida to meet with Mr. Trump’s transition team, although not all scored a face-to-face with Mr. Trump. Debra OConnell, the Disney executive who oversees ABC News, dined in December with Susie Wiles, the incoming White House chief of staff.
Mr. Trump’s green-room-to-Cabinet-Room pipeline reflects, in part, Fox News’s enduring role as a public square in conservative politics. Since 1996, it has been the network of choice for aspiring right-wing pundits and politicians to enhance their public profile, and a landing pad for Republican officials transitioning out of government.
It also highlights the complex dynamic between Mr. Trump and Fox News, whose programming he frequently watches and often complains about.
Other news networks have had ties to a sitting president. Jon Meacham was still a MSNBC contributor when he began writing speeches for Mr. Biden. (MSNBC promptly ended Mr. Meacham’s contract.) The current White House press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, was previously an MSNBC pundit. MSNBC also hired Jen Psaki and Symone D. Sanders — the former chief spokeswomen for President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris — after they left the Biden administration.
Mr. Trump’s staffing picks go well beyond the communications realm. He has nominated Fox personalities for management positions with influence over millions of voters and federal workers.
Mr. Hegseth is poised to move from active duty as a Fox News host to overseeing the Pentagon. Sean Duffy, a Fox Business host, is Mr. Trump’s pick for transportation secretary. Tom Homan, a Fox contributor, has been tapped to be his border czar. Dr. Janette Nesheiwat, who explained the Covid pandemic to Fox viewers, is nominated for surgeon general.
There’s Mike Huckabee, who hosted a Fox News show for seven years, as ambassador to Israel. Tulsi Gabbard, who left a Fox gig in August, is up for national intelligence director. Two longtime Fox commentators, Tammy Bruce and Monica Crowley, are headed to the State Department. At least 11 other people with connections to Fox — including Sebastian Gorka, Kimberly Guilfoyle, and Keith Kellogg — are headed to administration jobs, too.
Some of the Fox alumni headed to the administration are more connected to Fox than others.
Sergio Gor, who will lead the White House Presidential Personnel Office, has not worked for Fox since 2012, when he was a booker for Neil Cavuto. Morgan Ortagus, nominated by Mr. Trump as a deputy special presidential envoy to the Middle East, worked as a network contributor for only two months in early 2019.
Ms. Ortagus was a State Department spokeswoman in Mr. Trump’s first term, and the president-elect has expressed some skepticism about her. “Early on Morgan fought me for three years, but hopefully has learned her lesson,” he wrote in announcing her new role. “These things usually don’t work out, but she has strong Republican support, and I’m not doing this for me, I’m doing it for them. Let’s see what happens.”
Mr. Wallace said that he believed the preponderance of Fox alumni in the upcoming administration reflected well on his network. “It’s a testament,” he said, “to the types of people we’ve picked in the past.”
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