UPDATE [02/10/23, 3:55 p.m. EST]:
A Fox Corp. spokesperson said in an email statement to IJR, “After the White House reached out to FOX Soul Thursday evening, there was some initial confusion. FOX Soul looks forward to interviewing the President for Super Bowl Sunday.”
It appears President Joe Biden will be participating in the annual tradition of giving a pre-game interview before the Super Bowl after all.
The network that airs the game typically gets an interview with the president. This year, it happens to be Fox.
White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre tweeted Friday morning, “The President was looking forward to an interview with Fox Soul to discuss the Super Bowl, the State of the Union, and critical issues impacting the everyday lives of Black Americans.”
“We’ve been informed that Fox Corp has asked for the interview to be cancelled,” she added.
The President was looking forward to an interview with Fox Soul to discuss the Super Bowl, the State of the Union, and critical issues impacting the everyday lives of Black Americans. We’ve been informed that Fox Corp has asked for the interview to be cancelled.
— Karine Jean-Pierre (@PressSec) February 10, 2023
A report from Variety cited an unnamed Fox executive who pointed the finger at what looked like it would be a lack of an interview at the administration
“We offered an interview with our top news anchors with no strings attached — they’re walking away from a huge audience and it’s a major missed opportunity,” the executive said.
Fox News’ Brett Baier said after Biden’s State of the Union address, “We have formally asked for that interview, but we have not received an answer yet, whether they are going to officially do it or not.”
“We are running out of days,” he added.
Some liberal commentators have taken issue with Fox News’ talent and suggested Biden should snub the network this year. Joy Behar, a co-host of ABC’s “The View,” called the anchors at Fox “liars.”
Meanwhile, the show’s Sunny Hostin quipped, “I have trouble believing that he should sit down even with a Shannon Bream or a Bret Baier because the bottom line is they work for a network that puts forth conspiracy theories, they [have] election deniers.”
It is not clear what the issue was which led to the apparent scuttling of the interview. Although it seems clear Biden and his aides are not comfortable with the idea of him sitting down with Fox News, which probably did not help with discussions about a potential interview.
As CNN notes, “Biden has not granted Fox News a single interview during his presidency, despite the network repeatedly asking. That’s likely due to how the right-wing channel portrays him and his administration, with extremists such as Tucker Carlson regularly launching vicious attacks on him.”
The word “extremists” in reference to a commentator is, well, extreme and a little ridiculous. But CNN’s article pointed out the interview would have likely been conducted by “Bret Baier, who is a much more respected, traditional news anchor, albeit one that leans conservative.”
It is understandable the president would not want to sit down with a network hostile to him. However, it would have been an opportunity to advance his message to an audience that was probably a little different than the one tuning into the State of the Union.
There was also the chance he could have a poor performance and hand deliver the network plenty of fodder for questions about his mental state.
And it is not clear what caused the confusion. But for a president who has given relatively few formal interviews or press conferences over the course of his first term, it would be disappointing if Americans lost out on an opportunity to hear from him without a script or through a spokesperson.
