A year after promising viewers a “red tsunami” in the 2022 midterms, only to be left with egg on their faces after the GOP drastically underperformed, Fox News was once again wondering what went wrong after Democrats romped to victory in statewide elections on Tuesday night.
Despite recent polls showing President Joe Biden deeply underwater with voters and even losing to Donald Trump in several battleground states, the Democratic incumbent governor easily won victory over his MAGA-endorsed opponent in deep-red Kentucky. And over in Ohio, a state Trump won by eight points in 2020, voters overwhelmingly passed an amendment ensuring access to abortion care in the state’s constitution.
The continued drag that undoing Roe v. Wade has had on the GOP was especially apparent in Virginia, where Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin had promised to implement a 15-week abortion ban if the GOP was able to gain unified control over the state’s General Assembly. Instead, not only were Youngkin’s hopes of a Republican sweep dashed, but the Democrats now control both chambers.
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Youngkin’s face-plant in Virginia, along with the results in Ohio and Kentucky, left Fox News in a state of shock, huffing so-called “copium” as they desperately searched for answers. In the end, two things were clear at the conservative cable giant by Wednesday morning: Youngkin was no longer presidential material, and it was time for the GOP to learn to love abortion.
With the results pouring in while Fox News star (and chief Republican cheerleader) Sean Hannity was on the air, conservative viewers saw in real-time that it was a bad night for the GOP and its agenda.
While the network had spent the past two days hyping up Biden’s bad poll numbers to lay the ground for Republican victories on election night, a morose Hannity opened his 9 p.m. show by informing viewers that Fox News had already projected that Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear had defeated GOP candidate Daniel Cameron. A short time later, he was also tasked with announcing that the Ohio abortion rights measure had passed.
Throughout the rest of Hannity’s broadcast, the one-time Trump White House shadow chief of staff huddled with his right-wing Fox colleagues to figure out what the GOP could do to actually win elections in a post-Roe environment.
“If we’re really going to be honest about this, and I consider myself pro-life, but I understand that’s not where the country is,” Hannity conceded, adding: “I have to believe that is an indication that the women in America, suburban moms, want it probably legal and rare and probably earlier than at the point of viability.” (Following the GOP’s defeat in the 2012 presidential election, Hannity famously suggested the party should become pro-immigrant in order to compete. That didn’t last long.)
Hannity also groused that Republicans’ push to ban abortion in states across the country, as well as the reversal of the federal right to abortion, meant that “Democrats are trying to scare women into thinking Republicans don’t want abortion legal under any circumstances.”
Former Trump White House press secretary and current Fox News host Kayleigh McEnany, meanwhile, suggested that this was all a matter of messaging. Saying that the GOP should “not just be a pro-baby party,” she called on the party to propose more “pro-mother” bills to appeal to women voters.
“We need a national strategy. Tomorrow, I want the House of Representatives passing legislation for men to pay women child support from the moment of conception, legislation to make the child tax credit apply to the unborn, legislation for women to have access to the supplemental food and nutrition program up to two years after childbirth,” she demanded. “These are things that could be done today that will make a difference! But until we own this issue as a party, we will lose again, and again, and again.”
While the other cable news networks stuck with live special coverage for the rest of the evening, Fox News decided that its audience needed a break from the deflating electoral results for conservatives. After Hannity signed off at 10 p.m., Fox aired its regularly scheduled broadcast of “comedy” show Gutfeld!, which was pre-taped and didn’t make any mention of the elections.
The following morning, it was also clear that Democrats had swept in Virginia, prompting the crew of Fox’s morning flagship show to actively bury Youngkin as a possible 2024 alternative to Trump. At the same time, the denizens of Fox & Friends also urged the GOP to figure out a way to get past the abortion issue.
“Ever since Roe was overturned, pretty much every time the Democrats have run on abortion, they have won, and was last night a harbinger for 2024? Absolutely,” Fox & Friends co-host Steve Doocy argued.
Meanwhile, Doocy’s colleague Ainsley Earhardt, an ardent Christian conservative, went even further in telling Republicans that they should set aside their anti-abortion principles to win elections and nakedly gain more power.
“Republicans need to look at all of these numbers, and really think about what’s more important. Yes, most people that are Republicans are probably pro-life,” she stated. “And we love our babies. And I love being a mother. But what’s most important? Republicans taking over. And Republicans being able to keep our country!”
Co-host Lawrence Jones added that most voters don’t approve of full abortion bans with no exceptions, urging Republicans to “talk directly to the people” and “give and take on some issues.”
The biggest takeaway on Wednesday morning, though, was that Fox News wanted it known that they were pulling the plug on Youngkin 2024 before it ever began.
The Virginia governor, whose successful gubernatorial bid was heavily boosted by Fox, had been encouraged earlier this year by network founder Rupert Murdoch to launch a last-minute presidential bid. Murdoch’s other media entities had already helped lay the groundwork for a possible White House run while he kept the idea afloat, especially since the other non-Trump candidates had yet to seriously contend with the ex-president.
“What an epic failure by Governor Youngkin. It’s a huge loss for him,” Fox & Friends co-host Brian Kilmeade fumed, adding that this had destroyed any chance of him running for president in 2024 and “definitely ’28.” Fox News White House correspondent Peter Doocy also delivered the message that Youngkin was toast. During a report on Fox & Friends, the younger Doocy said that Tuesday night’s results are “potentially lethal to this theory that Youngkin could ride a red wave in Richmond to a last-minute presidential campaign as a dark horse Trump alternative in 2024.”
Making it even more bittersweet for Youngkin: Fox & Friends had broadcasted live from a Virginia diner the previous morning, looking to gin up support for Youngkin amid his push for a GOP-held legislature to help pass his conservative agenda.
Throughout the rest of Fox’s morning shows, the network’s personalities continued to pound home the narrative that Youngkin has become damaged goods.
“The Virginia state house will be fully under Democrat control,” anchor Harris Faulkner noted. “Youngkin was saying he wanted that not to happen. He wanted one side to flip. The whole Senate [is] up for grabs. None of that happened. That will prevent state Republicans from passing new abortion restrictions.”
It didn’t take long for Younkin to hear that siren call and acquiesce, telling reporters on Wednesday that he’s “not going anywhere” while finally closing the door on the 2024 run.
