“They don't know what to do with all of us,” Stinchfield said on the air Monday night. “We're killing it here on Newsmax with a tactic they've never tried. It's called the truth, the stone-cold truth, and once you get a taste of it, you will never tolerate being lied to again.”
In many cases, the opposite is true. Newsmax, the television arm of a conservative website, has reported falsely that
Yet Newsmax's burst, whether or not it lasts, has been astonishingly swift and could foreshadow the first serious threat to
“We've really cornered Fox from the right,” said
From the beginning of July to the week before
For the same dates,
“We love competition. We have always thrived on competition,”
Ruddy traced much of Newsmax's increase to Trump supporters angered by Fox's election night call that Democrat
Trump, who criticized Fox throughout the campaign, has driven the point home with repeated tweets suggesting his followers check out Newsmax or a smaller rival that also presses a conservative viewpoint, One America News Network.
“There's a large part of the country that wants to have a voice, the same people who gave birth to what turned into a very robust
Unlike Fox, Newsmax's news operation is largely non-existent. Most of the company's reporters are attached to a website, which at midday Wednesday led with stories about Trump's press secretary calling restrictions on
The television network is running a clever ad telling conservative viewers not to be “out-foxed,” but it was telling on Monday that both Newsmax and OANN spent considerable time discussing an interview that was conducted on Fox, where a Trump lawyer predicted her client would win by millions of votes.
Programming generally consists of news talk shows, and it's not difficult to see where the loyalty lies.
“Donald Trump is the most powerful person in the world,” said
When Newsmax's
“As far as I'm concerned,
Newsmax hasn't declared Biden the president-elect, unlike other news organizations, including Fox. Its personalities spend considerable time echoing theories about voter irregularities that have either been disproven or unaccompanied by evidence.
Even though Ruddy concedes in an interview that Trump has an extremely narrow chance of overturning the results, he said it's up to the states, not media organizations, to declare a winner.
But if the chances are really that small, why should a discussion about them dominate Newsmax's airtime?
“I think that people that are not pro-Trump or don't like him think we should get past it or they are tired of it,” he said. "But conservatives are quite anxious to hear about developments.”
He said he differs from Trump in believing the administration should be cooperating in a transition, even if the president holds out hope that the results could somehow be overturned.
“I would tell him if I speak to him that I think they should engage in a transition,” he said.
The spotlight on smaller rivals comes at an extraordinarily tumultuous time at Fox. There's always been a tension between the news and opinion sides of the network, but this time it's reflected in the ultimate “unspinnable” story of election results, said
In some respects, the surge in Newsmax’s viewership represents a temper tantrum by some Fox viewers, she said.
For Newsmax, a big question is whether its programming is compelling enough to hold viewers who are clearly sampling. Besides Kelly, former Trump press secretary
“It's going to be a challenge for (Newsmax) to grow their numbers in the way that Fox did because of the lack of a news operation,” Hemmer said.
The Wall Street Journal reported last weekend that Trump allies in
For conservative media, the overshadowing mystery is what Trump decides to do when he leaves office, whether he decides to start a media organization of his own or join an existing one.
Ruddy professes no insider knowledge, but said he doubts Trump would want to start his own company because it would cut him off from access to other media.
He doesn't think Trump would be interested in doing a daily show. Perhaps weekly, he said, and Newsmax would be interested in having him.
Associated Press Television Writer
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