Well, that settles it. Maybe it’s the answer everyone expected but we were still left guessing for the past few weeks while Trump hinted back and forth.
The New York Times reported minutes ago that former President Donald Trump plans to skip the first Republican debate next week and will instead do a sitdown interview with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson:
Former President Donald J. Trump plans to upstage the first Republican primary debate on Wednesday by sitting for an online interview with the former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, according to multiple people briefed on the matter.
In the past 24 hours, Mr. Trump has told people close to him that he has made up his mind and will skip the debate in Milwaukee, according to two of the people briefed on the matter.
Mr. Trump is notoriously mercurial, and left himself something of an out to change his mind with an ambiguous post on his website, Truth Social, on Thursday. He wrote that he’s polling well ahead of his rivals and added, “Reagan didn’t do it, and neither did others. People know my Record, one of the BEST EVER, so why would I Debate?”
There are a few things at play here.
First, Trump has been increasingly critical of Fox News’ primary coverage. In his view, his formerly favorite network started leaning toward promoting DeSantis quite heavily. Whether it was poll numbers they chose to report or just generally more positive coverage in general, Trump was feeling slighted.
In addition, given Trump truly is racing so far ahead of his primary opponents, standing on a debate stage would certainly give his challengers millions more eyeballs compared to his absence. Recent reports indicated that executives at Fox News had been trying to persuade Trump to join, somewhat out of fear of a ratings collapse if he wasn’t on the bill.
While the specific Trump-Tucker interview details have yet to be released, Fox will take it as a direct attack if it’s airing at the same time as the debate:
The timing of the interview with Mr. Carlson remains unclear, but if it goes ahead as currently planned, the debate-night counterprogramming would serve as an act of open hostility.
The chairwoman of the R.N.C., Ronna McDaniel, has privately urged Mr. Trump to attend the debate, even traveling to his private club in Bedminster, N.J., last month to make her pitch in person.
As far as debate counter-programming goes, the Trump-Tucker event will be a match made in heaven.
With Trump intending to skip the debate, it would leave seven candidates on stage in Milwaukee coming up in mere days.
