Many TV viewers believe Fox News Channel is defined by "Fox & Friends" and Sean Hannity. But they're probably not watching what airs in between.
"Special Report With Bret Baier" offers a more balanced review of the day's events; the show's host probably is not on Donald Trump's Christmas-card list.
Despite his low opinion of Baier, the president may very well be watching Wednesday when the anchor and Martha MacCallum moderate a live town hall from Milwaukee with presidential candidate and Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn.
Baier, 48, spoke last week from his New York office about the Democratic National Committee's decision to not allow Fox to host any of its debates, Trump's tweets and how Baier feels about his colleagues labeling journalists "enemies of the people."
Q: How do you go about preparing for one of these town halls?
A: It takes a lot. We have a thing called the "brain room," which is essentially a group of researchers. We get a big folder from them that gives us a lot of background, transcripts from other town halls they'd done, policy positions. It's like cramming for a test in college. Our biggest role is generating questions from the audience and then think about how we can redirect questions if the answers are less than responsive.
Q: What do you say to those who believe no Democratic candidate is going to be treated fairly when they go on Fox?
A: Sometimes the loudest critics of Fox are the people who haven't watched me. I tell those people on Twitter and Facebook to watch me three times and then let me know if I'm being fair. I think you just have to talk to Bernie Sanders. He has said we were very fair to him when we did our town hall in Pennsylvania. I think you can also look at the grilling we've given Republicans in the past. I think you can look at the work of Chris Wallace, who is arguably the best debate moderator there is. On the news side of the house, we're trying to make sure Democrats get a fair shake, but we're not promising it's not going to be tough.
