Donald Trump, in Feud With Fox News, Shuns Debate

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Donald Trump and Fox News, the candidate who has reordered the Republican presidential race and the cable network of choice for many of the party’s voters, stared each other down over his demand that the news anchor Megyn Kelly be dumped from moderating a debate, the last before Iowa’s caucuses. The network did not blink. So Trump walked.

His announcement that he would “probably,” or would “most likely,” or was “pretty close to” irrevocably planning to skip the debate — an aide put it more directly — created a gaping uncertainty at the center of the Republican nominating contest just as it was formally about to begin in Iowa. It was the most intense confrontation yet between two mutually dependent but increasingly antagonistic powerhouses of media and politics. Mr. Trump, who has made the presidential race into a riveting television spectacle, was overtly exploiting the ratings leverage his candidacy has created to try to bend Fox News to his will. “Let’s see how much money Fox is going to make on the debate without me,” he said.


Donald Trump, in Feud With Fox News, Shuns Debate Donald Trump vows to boycott Republican debate (Financial Times)