Matt Gertz
The National Memo
Washington, DC, United States
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Past articles by Matt:
How Fox Executives And Anchor Tried To Subvert 2020 Election Night Reporting
Fox executives sell ads by touting the purported firewall between the network’s right-wing “opinion side” and its respectable “news side.” But here we have the network’s top “news side” anchor imploring the head of “news side” programming to make the “news side” decision desk fraudulently award a st... → Read More
How Fox Executives And Anchor Tried To Subvert 2020 Election Night Reporting
Top Fox News executives interfered with the election projections of the network’s vaunted “decision desk” due to blowback from then-President Donald Trump, according to a new book. The reports — and the actions Fox took with regard to its decision desk following the 2020 election → Read More
Right-Wing Pundits Warn Graham: Being Honest About Abortion Ban Means Midterm Defeat
But some Republican leaders are trying to distance the party from Graham’s legislation, apparently fearing an electoral backlash that could swamp GOP efforts to take back the U.S. House and Senate. Fox News is largely ignoring the bill for the same reason. And some on the right are explicitly slammi... → Read More
Right-Wing Pundits Warn Graham: Being Honest About Abortion Ban Means Midterm Defeat
Note that none of these right-wingers oppose federal abortion bans on the merits. When the Supreme Court overturned Roe, Walsh tweeted that “federal ban on abortion nationwide is the next step.” During his interview with Graham, Watters stressed that he agreed with the senator on the merits of the p... → Read More
Fox-Inspired Durham Probe Of Russia Investigation Fizzles Out
Fox News spent years smearing the Justice Department investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election as a criminal conspiracy by Obama administration officials and the “deep state” against Donald Trump. The network’s campaign ultimately spawned a sprawling probe → Read More
Fox-Inspired Durham Probe Of Russia Investigation Fizzles Out
The special counsel ultimately developed cases against three individuals, but as the Times noted, “he has not charged any conspiracy or put any high-level officials on trial.” Former FBI lawyer Kevin Clinesmith pleaded guilty for altering a document used to justify the surveillance of a Trump campai... → Read More
Fox-Inspired Durham Probe Of Russia Investigation Fizzles Out
But at the same time, the probe wasn’t a total loss — it provided Hannity and his ilk with a steady stream of content. I noted after the jury found Sussmann not guilty that Fox had aired more than 2,000 weekday segments that discussed Durham’s investigation or the origins of the Russia probe since h... → Read More
How Fox News And Trump Attempted To Frame John Kerry
Geoffrey Berman, a former top federal prosecutor during Donald Trump’s administration, reportedly writes in a new book that a spurious investigation of former Secretary of State John Kerry was set in motion in response to then-president Donald Trump’s May 2018 tweet accusing → Read More
How Fox News And Trump Attempted To Frame John Kerry
Indeed, conservatives were raising the prospect that Kerry had violated the Logan Act – including Fox & Friends host Steve Doocy earlier that morning, in a segment the then-president likely watched. But as University of Texas School of Law professor Stephen Vladeck explained in the Globe report,... → Read More
How Fox News And Trump Attempted To Frame John Kerry
Fox’s criticism of Kerry continued into the next day on Fox & Friends, including a segment in which co-host Brian Kilmeade claimed his action “seems to be a violation of the Logan Act,” while his guest compared the former secretary of state to the Taliban. Roughly an hour after that, Trump tweet... → Read More
Tucker Carlson Reacts To Biden Speech With Bogus Indignation
“It’s amazing how Soviet the whole thing is. Joe Biden calls for political purges and law enforcement crackdowns on his political opponents, and state media cheer him on,” Carlson said, simply making up topics that weren’t in the speech and getting mad about them.He then complained that a speech abo... → Read More
Deeply Involved In Coup Plot, Gingrich Is Summoned By House Select Panel
Gingrich joined Fox as a contributor in 1999 and is known for his demagogic commentary. In recent weeks, he has warned that “a cult of anti-white racism” is attempting to “impose itself on the country” and alleged that the FBI, which “could actually be called the American Stasi,” had “declared war o... → Read More
Deeply Involved In Coup Plot, Gingrich Is Summoned By House Select Panel
Gingrich similarly used his media appearances to “arouse the country’s anger” with false claims of voter fraud and to try to encourage Trump supporters to “bring pressure on legislators and governors.”“I would say to every person in Georgia who favors Donald J. Trump: Go to the governor's mansion, p... → Read More
Deeply Involved In Coup Plot, Gingrich Is Summoned By House Select Panel
The House select committee investigating the January 6 insurrection sent a letter on Thursday to Fox contributor and former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich seeking his testimony. The committee says he advised former President Donald Trump’s effort to subvert the 2020 election → Read More
For Right-Wing Pundits, Garland Is Damned If He Indicts Trump
The Justice Department keeps revealing damning details about the ongoing investigation into Donald Trump’s illicit possession of highly classified documents and his alleged effort to conceal and retain those materials. That has some commentators arguing against an indictment → Read More
For Right-Wing Pundits, Garland Is Damned If He Indicts Trump
McCarthy’s August 9 column, written in the immediate aftermath of the Mar-a-Lago search, provided a somewhat more sober version of the incendiary conspiracy theories of a justice system weaponized for Democratic benefit that were replete at the time on Fox. The National Review columnist argued that ... → Read More
For Right-Wing Pundits, Garland Is Damned If He Indicts Trump
After Tuesday’s damning DOJ filing, however, McCarthy concluded in his August 31 column that the DOJ possesses “formidable” evidence of obstruction on Trump’s part and that Attorney General Merrick Garland will likely approve charges. That evidence is so damning, in fact, that McCarthy wrote that th... → Read More
Right-Wing Attacks On Mar-a-Lago Search Are Not Aging Well
“Last night's raid of the former president's home had nothing to do with the retention of classified materials. You can handle missing records with a subpoena. You don't come kicking the doors in,” as Fox host Will Cain put it. “Everyone knows what this is really about. Finding something, anything, ... → Read More
Right-Wing Attacks On Mar-a-Lago Search Are Not Aging Well
So it was for many other talking points that Trump and his associates had promulgated and his media allies subsequently trumpeted. The Trump passports taken in the search and promptly returned, which his defenders portrayed as a “huge violation of the Fourth Amendment”? They had been mixed up with c... → Read More
Right-Wing Attacks On Mar-a-Lago Search Are Not Aging Well
After the FBI searched Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort and residence on August 8, the former president’s media allies had the opportunity to pause and consider the possibility that it might be part of a legitimate inquiry. Instead, they rushed to support the former president’s loud → Read More