Newsmax, the conservative news channel, has reportedly ordered staffers to refrain from criticizing Pete Hegseth, Trump’s nominee to be secretary of defense.
The directive comes after Newsmax host Greg Kelly argued on-air a week ago that disclosures about Hegseth had doomed his nomination.
Discussing a letter in which Hegseth’s mother said her son had abused women, Kelly said, “this secretary of defense thing is not going to happen.” Kelly also chided Hegseth for reportedly not informing Trump ahead of time about allegations of assault and public drunkenness.
Mediaite now reports that multiple sources inside Newsmax told them that network CEO, Trump ally, and longtime conservative activist Chris Ruddy was contacted by Trump’s team and told that Trump was unhappy with the commentary.
According to Mediaite, Newsmax Chief Operating Officer Elliot Jacobson held a meeting with staff on Friday and told them that network reporting on Hegseth had to “focus on the positive.” The staff was reportedly told that they should “pivot” if the allegations against Hegseth come up on air and that failure to follow the network’s directive could lead to “termination.”
The Newsmax kerfuffle comes as a recently released opinion poll from Civiqs for Daily Kos (taken Dec. 7-10) found that 48% of registered voters oppose Hegseth’s nomination and only 42% support him. Hegseth is polling behind other Trump nominees like Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard, despite their significant baggage. The revelations about Hegseth’s past, in connection with the major position he has been nominated for, appear to be having a real effect.
Trump needs his nominee to have support from right-wing media, and pressuring Newsmax could ensure that occurs.
Historically, Newsmax has shown few qualms in being an advocate for Trump. In fact, doing so has cost the network. In 2021, voting services companies Dominion Voting Systems and Smartmatic sued Newsmax after the network aired falsehoods about purported attempts by Democrats to steal the 2020 election from Trump.
Personalities on the network had falsely alleged that votes had been changed from Trump to Joe Biden, that Smartmatic software was used to “fix elections,” that the companies were involved in “systemic fraud,” and that the companies had previously intervened in vote counts.
In September, Newsmax eventually settled out of court with Smartmatic for an undisclosed amount and released a statement saying, “Newsmax acknowledges that the Court found that ‘allegations regarding whether the [2020 U.S. presidential election] and its results were somehow altered or manipulated by Smartmatic are factually false/untrue.’”
Trump relies on conservative media like Newsmax and Fox News to set his policy agenda and to provide individuals that he selects to operate in his administration. These outlets are also key to promoting Trump and his message and pushing back on Newsmax before he is even inaugurated would certainly set the tone for the next few years of coverage.
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