All Hail Megyn Kelly, TV’s Top Newswoman
Megyn Kelly is suddenly the premier TV newswoman in America. Well, maybe “suddenly” is not quite accurate since her success did not exactly happen overnight. Her nightly news-and-talk show on Fox News Channel, The Kelly File, has been the centerpiece of FNC’s primetime lineup for more than two years, since October 2013. In recent months, though, the graph line on her public profile has shot up dramatically.
Fox News will host its third Republican presidential primary debate on Thursday, March 3 from Detroit. The 2-hour debate will air live at 9 p.m. ET. Bret Baier, Megyn Kelly and Chris Wallace will return as moderators.
Fox News’ Trump-less debate Thursday night drew 12.5 million viewers, the second-highest telecast in the network’s history but the second lowest-rated GOP debate of the cycle thus far.
Exclusives
Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes, in conversations with Trump, “acknowledged his concerns” about a statement the network had made in the days leading up to the debate, Fox said. But Fox said Trump had demanded a $5 million contribution to his charities in order to appear, which the network rejected.
Donald Trump’s declaration was an unexpected, if not unpredictable, twist in the final days of the Iowa campaign. The real estate mogul had threatened repeatedly to boycott debates before, only to ultimately acquiesce. By picking a fight publicly, Trump assured that even if he goes through with his plan not to show up Thursday, his absence will be the center of attention. Adding intrigue to the Democratic race, the White House said President Barack Obama would host Bernie Sanders for an Oval Office meeting.
Last week’s article in New York magazine saying that Fox News Channel leader Roger Ailes “has become less visible” to its anchors and producers on a day-to-day basis, drew this response from News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch: “Oh, it’s bullshit. Absolutely. I’ve got every confidence in Roger, you know? His health is fine. It’s true he had a little problem with his back for awhile, but otherwise, he’s micromanaging the place just as much as ever.”
According to four high-placed Fox sources, Murdoch is upping his presence at Fox while Roger Ailes has become less visible to anchors and producers, signaling a shift that marks a new chapter in the network’s history. The most visible change is that, since June, Murdoch has been attending Ailes’s daily executive meeting held on the second floor of Fox headquarters.
The brightest star at Fox News, Megyn Kelly is a newly minted role model for women who sees her gender as irrelevant, and a conservative champion who transcends politics with her skillful skewering of windbags of both parties, most notably Donald Trump.
In 2015, primary debates fueled massive ratings increases for Fox News and CNN, while MSNBC began to rebuild.
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How Roger Ailes Built Fox News Channel
Ailes has spent a career straddling the worlds of politics and media. Today, Ailes runs one of the most valuable cable networks, on track to bring in $2.3 billion in revenue this year, per SNL Kagan, twice that of CNN. And now, the net has another jewel in its crown, boasting the most-watched non-sports cable program ever, with 24 million people tuning in for the first GOP debate this past August.
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Donald Trump has resumed criticizing Megyn Kelly, threatening to disrupt the fragile, on-again-off-again truce between himself and Fox News. Trump took to Twitter during Kelly’s Thursday night broadcast to criticize her guests, as “dumb puppets.” He also claimed that he didn’t watch her show — which is doubtful, given his tweets — and retweeted users who disparaged the program.
