According to Fox & Friends co-host Ainsley Earhardt, President Donald Trump’s nearly obsessive binge-watching of cable news is proof of his strong work ethic. “He watches every show,” the Fox host exclaimed about the president.
With just 24 hours left in Trump’s term—which ends with his leaving office with record-low approval ratings after inciting an insurrectionist Capitol riot—the hosts of his favorite morning program seemingly came to grips with the reality that the next White House occupant won’t be such a devoted viewer of theirs.
Besides complaining about seditious terrorists being labeled as “terrorists” and grumbling that Trump followers are unfairly accused of acting like a “cult,” the Fox & Friends crew also took time to do some rehabbing of the outgoing president’s presumably wounded ego.
ADVERTISEMENT
Discussing President-elect Joe Biden’s favorability ratings with pollster Kristen Soltis Anderson, Earhardt wondered aloud what Biden needs to do to unify the country amid extreme partisan polarization. After Anderson said Biden pushing a “too far to the left agenda” could unify Republicans in opposition to him, Earhardt suddenly pivoted to gushing over Trump.
“They’ll criticize President Trump but no one can argue: He is a worker,” the Fox host exclaimed. “He doesn’t drink alcohol, he stays up late at night, he watches every show, he’s working.”
She continued: “He got to work immediately. And now Joe Biden is saying he’s going to get to work on immigration on the first day in office.”
Throughout the Trump era, Fox hosts have repeatedly gone out of their way to describe the notoriously work-averse president as an extremely hard worker, largely pointing to the president’s obsessive tweeting and nearly round-the-clock TV viewing habits as evidence of his virtuousness.
Former Fox Business Network host Trish Regan, for instance, once claimed that Trump spent all hours tweeting because he is a “workaholic.” And Fox News anchor Martha MacCallum has repeatedly insisted the president “loves to work,” claiming that Trump’s “executive time”—a much-mocked carveout in the president’s schedule reportedly for TV watching—actually “sounds a lot like work.”
And Earhardt herself has previously painted the president, the son of a millionaire who grew up in New York City, as a “Rust Belt” guy and “blue-collar” worker.
