Former President Donald Trump has said that he will ask media mogul Rupert Murdoch to stop Fox News from airing negative political ads against him ahead of the election.
“I’m going to see Rupert Murdoch,” Trump said during an Oct. 18 appearance on “Fox and Friends.”
“I’m going to tell him something very simple, because I can’t talk to anybody else about it: Don’t put on negative commercials for 21 days.”
Murdoch, 93, stepped down as chairman of Fox News’ parent company, Fox Corp., last year, ending a seven-decade career that spawned a media empire. His son, Lachlan, now serves as the company’s chairman and CEO.
Trump said he wasn’t sure the older Murdoch would be “thrilled” with his disclosing their meeting on air but said that he was planning to say: “‘Rupert, please do it this way.’ And then we’re going to have a victory, because I think everybody wants to have a victory.”
Echoing that criticism on Oct. 18, he said: “In the old days, you never played negative ads. ... When I leave here, I’ll then be hit by five or six ads.”
Host Brian Kilmeade responded that the network airs the ads because advertisers pay for those time slots.
David Plouffe, a senior adviser to the Harris campaign, called the interview an “ambush” in a social media post, while the campaign accused Fox News of selectively editing a video clip of Trump that aired during the interview.
