Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump stated that Fox News host and primetime debate anchor Megyn Kelly had “blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever” during the first debate on Friday’s “CNN Tonight.”
Trump was asked if he thought Fox News had an “agenda” to “target him.” He answered, “Well, probably. I don’t know. Probably. Who cares. I don’t really care. I mean, I do my thing, and whatever it is. I’m leading in all the polls. So, hey probably have an agenda. I’m very disappointed in Fox News. … I think they probably had an agenda. But, certainly, I don’t have a lot of respect for Megyn Kelly, she’s a lightweight. And she came out there reading her little script, and trying to be tough and be sharp. And when you meet her, you realize she’s not very tough, and she’s not very sharp. She’s zippo.”
He added of Kelly, “I just don’t respect her as a journalist. I have no respect for her, I don’t think she’s very good. I think she’s highly overrated. … She gets out, and she tarts asking me all sorts of ridiculous questions. And you know, you can see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever, but she was, in my opinion, she was off base. And by the way, not in my opinion, in the opinion of hundreds of thousands of people on Twitter. Because it has been a brutal day. In one way, a great day for Fox. In another day, in the Twittersphere, it’s been very bad, because she’s been very badly criticized. She’s a lightweight. I couldn’t care less about her.”
Trump was asked about some of his tweets, including one where he retweeted a tweet calling Kelly a “bimbo,” and one of his aides retweeting another saying “we can gut her.” Trump stated he hadn’t seen the “we can gut her” tweet. And “She’s is able to take care of herself. She’s somebody that’s, pretty tough, and I’m sure she can take care of herself. But, you know she’s just somebody I don’t have a lot of respect for. I don’t think she’s got major talent. I don’t think she’s got very much talent at all. I mean, she’s sitting there, reading questions. She rehearsed for it for a long time.” He also criticized moderator “Fox News Sunday” host as being only a “tiny fraction” as good as his dad Mike Wallace, and there was “blood pouring out of his eyes, too.”
Trump added, “I’m doing Fox a favor by doing this show. … And then they come out with these vicious questions.”
He continued “Well, I don’t think Fox treats me well. I really like the guys on ‘Fox & Friends.’ I do like Sean Hannity, he’s terrific guy. I like Bill O’Reilly, he’s a fantastic guy, but — and Greta is great. But, I don’t think that Fox, they have, Krauthammer, who’s the worst. They have George Will, who is the dour George Will. He has nothing good to ever say about me. And I could tell you why, I mean, something happened 12 years ago where I did a number on him. I understand that. … I don’t want to explain it. But, he’ll explain it. But George will is, pathetic. I lost all respect, frankly for Bret Baier, I knew him, and I liked him, but I don’t have any respect for him anymore because of the way he handled the situation.”
He concluded that he wasn’t sure if he would do another Fox debate, and “I didn’t think they were fair. And you know, frankly, it was on ‘Morning Joe,’ another great guy, Joe Scarborough and Mika, two great people. But they thought I got treated very unfairly. … If you check out Joe Scarborough and Mika, they were shocked at the questions that I got, versus others. Now, you could make them all tough, and that’s fine, or make them all softer, and that’s fine.”
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