Fox News has stated the network’s controversial chyron this week, referring to President Joe Biden as a “wannabe dictator” which aired as part of its primetime broadcast on Tuesday, June 13.
“The chyron was taken down immediately and was addressed,” a spokesperson for Fox News said in a statement to CNN. The network has also reportedly “taken steps to address the situation internally,” according to the rep. No further details have been given.
On Tuesday, former President Donald Trump was arrested and pleaded not guilty to 37 felony counts related to the handling of classified documents. Fox News then aired Trump’s speech following his arraignment, while other networks (such as CNN and MSNBC) did not. The aforementioned chyron, which read in full, “Wannabe Dictator Speaks at the White House After Having His Political Rival Arrested,” appeared on the screen alongside a split of President Biden and Trump. This happened during Fox News Tonight (with guest host Brian Kilmeade), which now fills the 8/7c slot following Fox News firing Tucker Carlson in April.
The only comment from the White House thus far about the chyron came from Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, who said, “There are probably 787 million things I can say … about what we saw last night. But I don’t think I’m going to get into it.”
Biden and the White House have said that he is not involved in investigations by the Justice Department, which operates separately from the influence of the White House. A special counsel is working the case against Trump, with the Justice Department’s allegations including that Trump had classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach.
In recent months, Fox News has lost advertisers, has been in the news for defamation trials with Dominion Voting Systems (that resulted in a settlement) and Smartmatic (which is ongoing), and is facing right-wing competition from other outlets like OAN and Newsmax.