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The Trump-Ailes Buddy Act
The Trump-Ailes Buddy Act
Trump TV.
What other explanation could there be for Donald Trump’s retaining Roger Ailes, the ousted chairman of Fox News and serial misogynist, as a top adviser to his presidential campaign?
Mr. Trump was already losing the women’s vote by double digits before last week, when multiple charges of sexual harassment against Mr. Ailes forced 21st Century Fox to pay the former anchor Gretchen Carlson a $20 million settlement. Surely Mr. Trump can’t now be counting on Mr. Ailes to dig him out of that hole and help him win the White House … right?
Ms. Carlson’s lawsuit, filed in early July, prompted two dozen women to come forward with accounts of Mr. Ailes’s predatory behavior and the Playboy Mansion culture he fostered at Fox. Two weeks later, he was out. Mr. Trump, who once told a female contestant on his TV show, “That must be a pretty picture, you dropping to your knees,” stood by his pal, bringing Mr. Ailes on board to help him prepare for the presidential debates. Mr. Trump even went on TV to accuse Ms. Carlson of being a fabulist. (Maybe he didn’t know that Ms. Carlson had a year’s worth of audio recordings of Mr. Ailes’s lewd remarks.)
So, lacking a logical reason for putting Mr. Ailes anywhere near the helm of a presidential campaign, one is forced to search for another answer. Maybe Mr. Trump needs Mr. Ailes to create his post-candidacy second act.
Mr. Trump may be looking to convert his campaign supporters into the audience for a new media company, and speculation about that has simmered throughout the summer. The Trump TV theory was first advanced in June in an article in Vanity Fair. Connecting the dots, the article surmised that Mr. Trump’s reality-TV outrageousness, the billions in free coverage he’s generated, his 11 million Twitter followers, and his die-hard base of white supremacists, could all be used to form an alt-right TV powerhouse.
Citing an unnamed source, the article said Mr. Trump “has become irked by his ability to create revenue for other media organizations without being able to take a cut himself. Such a situation ‘brings him to the conclusion that he has the business acumen and the ratings for his own network.’” Mr. Ailes made his name in political television when Richard Nixon hired him to help fan white anger over the civil rights movement. While in the Nixon White House, Mr. Ailes worked on a plan to create a pro-G.O.P. TV operation.
Imagine the possibilities! Stephen Bannon, Mr. Trump’s campaign chief and head of Breitbart News, could be the Trump TV program director, churning out hits like “Conspiracy Theory Machine Factory.” Corey Lewandowski, the former Trump campaign staffer who manhandled, then denied he manhandled, a female reporter, could quit his commentator job at CNN to anchor his own show, titled “You’re Delusional.” Gov. Chris Christie could report on transportation, with a regular segment called “Traffic Problems in New Jersey.” The foreign affairs desk, of course, could be left in the capable hands of Vladimir Putin.
And behind it all would be Mr. Ailes, the man whose behavior forced Fox to make this apology last week: “We sincerely regret and apologize for the fact that Gretchen was not treated with the respect and dignity that she and all of our colleagues deserve.”
Stay tuned: For this TV-land fantasy to play out, Mr. Trump will first have to lose the election. Mr. Ailes’s presence will help.
We live in a time in which decent and otherwise sensible people are surrendering too easily to the hectoring of morons or extremists.