What Does Fox News Host Harris Faulkner Know About Integrity?

Fox News anchor Harris Faulkner on Thursday seemingly defended the censorship of anti-Trump talk-show host Jimmy Kimmel: “We want an open market for speech,” she said. “But speech comes with more than responsibility, more than accountability. It comes with the expectation that we’ll have integrity when we use our speech.”

A glaring issue with Faulkner’s statement is that her standard, “integrity,” is in the eye of the beholder. And it’s particularly rich given that the Fox host’s own statements—and those of guests on her shows—don’t exactly use speech in such righteous ways, as Media Matters has thoroughly documented.

Earlier this month, for example, Faulkner suggested that people rightly questioning the legality of President Trump’s September 2 attack on a Venezuelan boat (which the president claims was “drug-carrying”) are “working against America and for the drug cartels.” In April, she asked a guest whether former President Barack Obama and “others in his political camp” are antisemitic for supporting Harvard University amid the Trump administration’s incursions. In February, she defended deporting pregnant women and children.

In November 2024, Faulkner proposed that Representative Rashida Tlaib is a “terrorist.” (“If you support terrorists, aren’t you a terrorist?” she asked rhetorically, equating the Palestinian American congresswoman’s pro-Palestinian advocacy with support for Hamas.) In January 2024, she accused Alejandro Mayorkas, Joe Biden’s homeland security secretary, of treason.

Guests on Faulkner’s shows—to say nothing of other Fox hosts and guests—also say plenty of noxious things, such as that drag queens reading to children normalize pedophilia, that Biden’s border policies “poison[ed] the bloodline in this country,” and that the woman at the center of Trump’s hush-money trial (and ultimately, felony conviction) was a “liar” and a “whore.”

Our math whiz commander in chief is once again promising to lower drug prices by 1,000 percent in the next year and a half—something that is virtually impossible.

“Now the drug companies agree that I’m right, and the countries … if they don’t agree, I’ll use tariffs to get them to agree. You understand?” Trump said in an interview on Fox News.

“We’re gonna be reducing drug costs over the next year, year and a half, by—not fifty or sixty percent—by a thousand percent. Because if you think, a $10 pill going so.… It’ll be raised up from $10 to $20 because it’s the world versus us,” Trump rambled. “So it’ll go from $10 to $20, from $10 to $50 or $60 for them. Which is bearable. And it’ll go from $10 to $20 for us.”

Incredibly, the interviewer did not request any immediate clarification.

This is not the first time Trump has tried to sell this particular strain of snake oil. Last month, Trump also claimed to have already cut drug costs by 1,000 percent. In reality, he hasn’t moved prices at all and has only sent a slurry of strongly worded letters to pharmaceutical companies demanding that they just lower their costs for Americans. And his tariff option, like most recklessly levied tariffs, might just raise the costs of prescription drugs even more.

“I find it really difficult to translate those numbers into some actual estimates that patients would see at the pharmacy counter,” Johns Hopkins University health policy professor Mariana Socal told the Associated Press last month, adding that Trump’s numbers were “really hard to follow.”

A month later, and they still aren’t making any sense.

Donald Trump is apparently intent on punishing media figures deemed guilty of lèse-majesté against him. The day after Jimmy Kimmel was censored at the behest of the Federal Communications Commission, the president told reporters that networks are “not allowed” to excessively bash him.

“When you have a network, and you have evening shows, and all they do is hit Trump, that’s all they do—if you go back, I guess they haven’t had a conservative one in years, or something.… When you go back and take a look, all they do is hit Trump. They’re licensed. They’re not allowed to do that,” Trump said Thursday aboard Air Force One.

On Wednesday, ABC suspended Jimmy Kimmel Live! after Nexstar Media Group and Sinclair Broadcast Group dropped the show. The affair was set in motion by FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, who threatened media companies that platform Kimmel after the comedian displayed the “sickest conduct possible,” Carr said. (In reality, Kimmel delivered a monologue in which he mocked Trump’s and MAGA’s ridiculous behavior in the wake of the fatal shooting of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.)

Trump warned of the move against Kimmel back in July. “I hear Jimmy Kimmel is next,” he wrote on Truth Social after CBS announced the cancellation of anti-Trump comedian Stephen Colbert’s late-night show (which many saw as a capitulation to the president). After Kimmel’s ouster Wednesday, Trump similarly called his next shots, urging NBC to suspend the shows of Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers.

A coalition of states is planning to release its own vaccine recommendations following Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s anti-vaccine takeover of the nation’s health institutions.

New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island have formed the Northeast Public Health Collaborative. New York City, which has the country’s largest municipal health department that is independent from the state, has also joined the group.

The group released its first round of Covid-19 vaccine recommendations Monday, advising that infants and toddlers between the ages of 6 months and 23 months, as well as adults over 19 years old, “should be vaccinated.” Healthy children between the ages of 2 and 18 do not need to be vaccinated but may receive the vaccine, according to the group.

While the group’s recommendations are in line with guidance from the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology, and the American Academy of Family Physicians, they vary vastly from those of the federal government.

Last month, the Food and Drug Administration approved updated Covid-19 shots for people aged 65 or above only, requiring younger adults and children to prove one high-risk health condition, such as asthma or obesity, in order to qualify for the jab.

“The Trump Administration walked away from its responsibility to protect public health,” wrote New York Governor Kathy Hochul on X Thursday. “Through the Northeast Public Health Collaborative, we’re making sure New Yorkers get the facts and access they need to stay protected.”

New York, New Jersey, Maine, Massachusetts, Vermont, and Rhode Island have all expanded access to Covid-19 vaccines, ordering that pharmacies must administer the shot in alignment with recommendations from trusted national medical societies.

California, Oregon, and Washington state have also formed their own West Coast Health Alliance to deliver independent vaccine recommendations.

Kennedy, who has spent much of his time in office promoting unproven medicine and fearmongering about vaccine side effects, has overseen a total upheaval of the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices. Just days before an upcoming meeting to discuss Covid-19 vaccinations for the fall, Kennedy added five new members to the panel, including some vaccine skeptics who had criticized vaccine mandates or downplayed the severity of the Covid-19 pandemic. Kennedy had previously added eight new members in June, after dismissing the original 17.

Susan Monarez, the former CDC director, testified before Congress Wednesday that Kennedy had asked her “to commit, in advance, to approving every” recommendation by the CDC’s ACIP, “regardless of scientific evidence.”

Top U.S. military leaders are considering a new recruitment strategy that would leverage Charlie Kirk’s legacy and memory to draw more of America’s youth into the armed services.

The Pentagon would frame the drive as a “national call to service,” according to U.S. officials who spoke with NBC News. Possible slogans for the recruitment effort include “Charlie has awakened a generation of warriors.”

The enlistment strategy could potentially involve Turning Point USA, Kirk’s political organization, morphing it into recruitment centers. “That could include inviting recruiters to be present at events or advertising for the military at the chapters,” NBC reported that two defense officials explained.

There are some 900 official college chapters and around 1,200 high school chapters of Turning Point USA across the nation, but the conservative advocacy nonprofit received more than 54,000 inquiries for new campus chapters in the 48 hours after Kirk’s assassination, according to TPUSA spokesman Andrew Kolvet.

The undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness, Anthony Tata, is the brains behind the initiative, sources told NBC News.

It was not immediately clear what the timeline for the drive would be, or if it will even come to fruition. Some dissent has already permeated among some Pentagon leaders, who are reportedly concerned about the P.R. nightmare that could ensue if it’s perceived the U.S. military is attempting to “capitalize on Kirk’s death,” officials told the news network.

Kirk was shot dead last week during an event at Utah Valley University. He was immediately martyred by the ideological right, which has since celebrated the 31-year-old firebrand as a pivotal figure in the MAGA movement.

A college dropout, Kirk had become one of the most prominent conservative activists in the country, attracting droves of young people to the Republican cause by meeting and debating them on college campuses. He was one of the few conservative personalities outside the Trump administration to maintain regular contact with the president, and was credited with playing a critical role in reelecting Donald Trump in 2024.

At The Atlantic Festival on Thursday, the former Vice President co-signed the firing of late-night host Jimmy Kimmel, while also identifying the exact reason it is unjust: because the Trump administration forced ABC to do it. 

“We ought ever to be vigilant, to ensure the right of every American to express their views without government interference or censorship,” Pence told The Atlantic’s Tim Alberta. “The First Amendment, though, does not protect entertainers who say crass or thoughtless things, as Jimmy Kimmel did in the wake of a national tragedy.”  

Kimmel poked fun at Trump’s admittedly strange change of subject when asked about how Charlie Kirk’s death affected him, and pointed out that the right was doing an all-out media blitz to convince the public that the shooter was a left-wing terrorist from a radical movement with little information out. 

Pence continued, getting so close to getting it right while still missing it completely. 

“Private employers have every right to dismiss employees, whether they’re a television talk show host or otherwise, if they violate the standards of that company. Now, I would have preferred that the chairman of the FCC  had not weighed in. But I respect the right of the networks to make the decision.” Pence went on to call Kimmel “callous” and “thoughtless” for his comments. 

The part Pence conveniently wedged between his very monotone outrage over Kimmel’s speech is what the issue is. This isn’t simply a disgruntled employer firing an employee for mouthing off; this is the Trump administration putting pressure on a network to fire someone for saying things they don’t like. From Mahmoud Khalil  to Rümeysa Öztürk to Kimmel, conservatives are being willfully obtuse about what speech crackdowns are really about. 

President Donald Trump on Thursday announced plans to station U.S. troops back in Afghanistan. The president, who campaigned on minimizing U.S. involvement in foreign entanglements, said he is in talks with the Taliban to regain control of Bagram air base.

The announcement came as Trump criticized the Biden administration’s 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan, which ended America’s longest war, during a press conference. Trump, arguing that he would have pulled out while retaining Bagram, described his efforts “to get it back,” without providing much detail.

“That could be a little breaking news,” Trump said. “We’re trying to get it back, because they need things from us. We want that base back.”

The president suggested that the Afghan air base, originally constructed by the Soviet Union in the 1950s, would serve a strategic purpose for Washington against China.

Without evidence, Trump alleged that “it’s an hour away from where China makes its nuclear weapons.” In recent months, he has repeatedly mused about the air base—claiming falsely that it is occupied or “controlled” by Beijing, and baselessly asserting its close proximity to Chinese nuclear weapons plants.

President Donald Trump is asking the Supreme Court to give him permission to fire whomever he wants—as long as he can come up with a reason.

The Trump administration went running to the Supreme Court Thursday to back up its efforts to oust Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled 2–1 Monday along ideological lines to block Cook’s removal, saying that she was likely to succeed in her statutory claim that she’d been fired without “cause,” as well as her procedural claim that she did not receive due process prior to her removal.

Trump’s attorney John D. Sauer submitted a request to stay the preliminary injunction Thursday, arguing that Cook was not entitled to due process and that Trump has a sweeping discretion to fire whomever he wanted as long as he claimed it was related to their job.

“The Federal Reserve Act’s broad ‘for cause’ provision rules out removal for no reason at all, or for policy disagreement,” Sauer wrote. “But so long as the President identifies a cause, the determination of ‘some cause relating to the conduct, ability, fitness, or competence of the officer’ is within the President’s unreviewable discretion,” Sauer wrote.

“The President’s strong concerns about the appearance of mortgage fraud, based on facially contradictory representations made to obtain mortgages by someone whose job is to set interest rates that affect Americans’ mortgages, satisfies any conception of cause,” Sauer continued.

(One might wonder if the same strong concerns would also apply to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who also made contradictory mortgage pledges, in his role shaping domestic and international economic policy.)

A federal district court had previously ruled that Trump couldn’t fire Cook over unproven allegations of mortgage fraud from Federal Housing Finance Agency Director William Pulte—who’s made similar accusations against a number of the president’s enemies—because it had nothing to do with her actual job. “For cause” typically refers to serious misconduct, or a neglect of duty.

Since Trump hit the campaign trail, the Supreme Court has been located securely in the president’s pocket, granting him “immunity” and then green-lighting move after move of his sweeping agenda when he resumed office. Despite the rulings of lower courts, it’s entirely possible this trend will continue.

The Federal Communications Commission’s involvement in canceling Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night show not only appears to have violated the First Amendment, but it also defied one of Donald Trump’s own executive orders.

Jimmy Kimmel Live! was put on indefinite hiatus Wednesday by Nexstar, one of the largest owners of ABC stations in the country, over supposedly controversial comments that Kimmel made about the political affiliation of Charlie Kirk’s suspected assassin. (Kimmel said that MAGA was rushing to claim that Tyler Robinson was “anything other than one of them”—which is technically true.)

The network, which is in the midst of a multibillion-dollar acquisition that requires the FCC’s approval, yanked Kimmel hours after the federal agency’s leader, Brendan Carr, publicly threatened to revoke the broadcast licenses of anyone still platforming the comedian.

But beyond the flagrant infringement by the government on Kimmel’s freedom of speech, the irony of Carr’s command is that it also breached the Trump administration’s own policies.

One of the first executive orders that Trump signed when he returned to office in January promised to ensure that “no Federal Government officer, employee, or agent” would engage or facilitate “any conduct that would unconstitutionally abridge the free speech of any American citizen.”

It also swore that “no taxpayer resources” would be used to similarly restrict a citizen’s First Amendment right to free speech.

The discrepancy should sic Attorney General Pam Bondi on Carr, as the order instructed should happen for any potential free speech infringements that the Trump administration deemed had occurred during the prior presidential administration.

Regardless, Nexstar’s decision was widely celebrated by conservatives. Trump wrote on Truth Social that Nexstar’s decision to unplug Kimmel was “great news for America,” while Carr commented to The Hollywood Reporter that the broadcast network was “doing the right thing.” Both suggested that more of America’s major television companies should follow suit.

President Trump took some time out of his press conference with British Prime Minister Kier Starmer to throw more dirt on Jimmy Kimmel’s name and mislead the public about why he was actually fired Wednesday night. 

“We saw the dismissal of a very well-known chat show host in America last night, Mr. Kimmel,” a British journalist asked Trump. 

“Well, Jimmy Kimmel was fired because he had bad ratings more than anything else, and he said a horrible thing about a great gentleman known as Charlie Kirk,” Trump replied. “And Jimmy Kimmel is not a talented person; he had very bad ratings. And they should’ve fired him a long time ago. So y’know, you can call that free speech or not. He was fired for lack of talent.” 

It seems clear at this point that Kimmel was fired because he dared to poke fun at Trump’s very flippant reaction to a question about Kirk’s death. Kimmel didn’t say anything that horrible, other than quoting Trump directly and noting that the administration was pushing Kirk’s shooter as a leftist terrorist without proper evidence.

The president and his administration, having already been trending toward McCarthyism for months, had their feelings hurt, and made FCC head Brendan Carr threaten to revoke the broadcasting licenses of ABC if it didn’t properly reprimand Kimmel.  

Trump trying to convince people that Kimmel mostly got fired because he was a bad host is facetious at best.