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Fox News host Bret Baier has been criticised for his attempts to talk over Kamala Harris during his interview with the presidential candidate on the conservative network.
The interview, which lasted 27 minutes, included several heated exchanges between the Democratic nominee and Baier, who has worked for Fox since 1998.
The pair frequently talked over each other, and Harris was much more animated than in other recent appearances as part of her media blitz.
Harris and Baier kicked off the conversation with a feisty exchange over immigration. The vice president then wrapped with a demand for Baier to focus the interview on a “full assessment of the facts.”
It was Harris’s first appearance on Fox and many have hit out at Baier for his treatment of the vice president during the interview, while complimenting Harris for how she handled the situation.
Community and Inside Out 2 actor Yvette Nicole Brown took to X/Twitter to ask Baier: “Would you have interrupted any other @VP of our country they way you rudely interrupted and tried to talk over @KamalaHarris? Asking for every woman in America.”
The American businessman and TV personality, Mark Cuban was full of praise for Harris and her performance. The 66-year-old wrote: “The beautiful thing about the @BretBaier interview is that @KamalaHarris understood and responded to each question. She used examples of policies. She gave real world context. When Brett went hard after her. She didn’t call him names. She didn’t quit the interview. She didn’t make things up. She never once complained the questions were tough. She never played the victim card. She didn’t lose her temper. She didn’t take the bait to diminish or talk down to Trump supporters. She stood up to him with force and never backed down.“
The author of If God is Love, Don’t Be a Jerk, John Pavlovitz added: “Bret Baier tries to talk over Kamala Harris in hopes of pivoting again and again so she isn’t able to state her position. She cuts through his bulls***. She is the leader we all deserve.”
Baier had earlier hit back at accusations from Trump supporters that the interview with Harris would be edited to make her seem more favourable.
The Fox News host took to X/Twitter on Monday night and Tuesday morning to assure people the interview, while pre-taped, would be aired as-live with minimal interruptions and no questions would be given to Harris ahead of time.“No one has the questions. Except me,” he told an X user. When another person assumed Baier would “pass [Harris] the questions” Baier rejected the claim.