From the moment President Donald Trump prematurely and falsely declared victory in the 2020 race early in the morning on Wednesday, Fox News’ Chris Wallace was among the first to denounce the irresponsible and dangerous comments. “This is an extremely flammable situation; the president just threw a match into it,” he told viewers.
Now, as Joe Biden closes in on a narrow electoral win, Wallace is actively pushing back on allegations of “fraud” that have been coming not only from the Trump campaign but also from many of his Fox News colleagues.
“As far as the lawsuits are concerned, that’s certainly the president and his representatives’ right to file them,” Wallace told Fox’s Dana Perino. “You go back, as I do, to 2000. We saw a serious legal case there. There was a 537 vote difference between Gore and Bush in Florida. You had the question of the butterfly ballots and the hanging chads. That seemed to be a really legitimate issue to litigate.”
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Noting that Perino previously asked Fox reporter John Roberts, “Is there any hard evidence of fraud?” Wallace answered, “There doesn’t seem to be so far. There seem to be some allegations but no hard evidence. And there is nothing that rises to the level that it could be enough fraud to switch votes when you’re talking about thousands and thousands of votes between the two candidates.”
Because the Fox News Decision Desk called Arizona for Biden Tuesday night, it has been the only major TV news network to show the Democratic ticket sitting at 264 electoral votes—just six shy of the 270 needed for victory. That means that the moment Nevada is called for Biden, Fox could be in the unexpected position of being the first to declare him as the president-elect, even before Pennsylvania finishes counting its ballots.
“Fox News has already called Arizona,” Wallace reminded viewers. “That’s caused a lot of heartburn in the Republican Party. But I did check in with our decision desk and they are not wavering. They say that our call in Arizona is right.”
As he put it, “If Biden wins at this point any of the three states I’ve talked about—Nevada, Pennsylvania, Georgia—he goes over the top.”
