Maria Bartiromo’s exit reveals the limits of Fox’s loyalty to Trump

President Trump and Fox News have a mostly mutually beneficial relationship. But every so often, their interests diverge, and Maria Bartiromo is a prime example. Fox

took Bartiromo off the air after she leaked internal network guidance to the Trump White House, a source familiar with the matter told CNN. The guidance specified that Fox’s programs should not follow Trump down a conspiratorial rabbit hole relating to the 2020 election. For all the talk of Fox being a pro-Trump media brand, which it is, the network still has lines that it tries not to cross. One of those lines has to do with election fraud conspiracy theories that might land Fox in court again. Fox paid three quarters of a billion dollars to settle Dominion’s defamation lawsuit in 2023 and it is still fighting another such suit, from the voting machine company Smartmatic. So when Fox says Bartiromo’s exit was a “business decision,” it’s true – the business often involves promoting the president’s agenda, but when his election lies endanger the bottom line, Fox puts its corporate interests ahead of political interests. Ousting a top star like Bartiromo serves as a message to everyone else at Fox: Don’t betray the boss. And the boss is not Trump, as much as he’d like to be. The people actually in charge at Fox are Rupert Murdoch, his son Lachlan and Fox News Media CEO Suzanne Scott. Their April 2023 dismissal of Tucker Carlson was an assertion that everyone is replaceable, even the top-rated host on Fox.