Trump Once Said Fox News Was ‘Hostile Network’ For Debate Because Bret Baier Didn’t Smile At Him During Interview

Former President Donald Trump’s campaign attacked CNN’s debate moderators this week, but Trump also once attacked Fox News as a “hostile network” for a debate because anchor Bret Baier didn’t smile at him, wasn’t “friendly” during an interview — and didn’t even say “Let’s have fun, Let’s Make America Great Again.”

On Monday, CNN anchor Kasie Hunt dumped out of an interview with Trump National Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt when Leavitt refused to quit attacking debate moderators Jake Tapper and Dana Bash. The incident led to backlash from Trump allies like Steve Bannon, who suggested Trump bail on the debate.

But attacking debate moderators is nothing new for Trump, who even railed against Fox News as a “hostile network” for a debate in an interview last June on then-Newsmax host Eric Bolling’s The Balance:

ERIC BOLLING: Bret Baier, you had an interview with Bret. He will be the moderator with Martha [MacCallum] on August 23rd on the first GOP debate. Will you join that debate?

DONALD TRUMP: Well, I am leading by a lot, and in many ways I’d love to, but in other ways it seems foolish when you’re up 40 points, 45 points, maybe more than that.

And you have guys like Hutchinson, who nobody ever heard of, who’s down at zero and Christie is down at one. And even Mike Pence, I saw number two. That was very discouraging. When you look at a number like that, it sort of — I feel badly about it. But he was down at two and three and Nikki Haley is down at two.

You know, you really say, what’s to gain by being out there and having everybody shooting at you?

And then you have a hostile network like Fox. Like when I did the Bret, the, the interview with Bret, I thought it was fine. I thought it was okay, but there was nothing friendly about it.

You know, it was nasty. And I thought I did a good job, I’ve been given credit for doing a good job. But I’ve also — people said, why would you do it?

Because it was really, you know, everything was like an unfriendly — it was always, everything was unfriendly. No smiling! No, uh, “Let’s have fun. Let’s make America great again.”

Everything was like a hit.

So, you know, you have a hostile network and you have people that are obviously the candidates are against you and they, they therefore are being hostile. So if you’re leading by 30, 40, or 50 points, what’s the purpose of really doing it?

Watch above via Newsmax TV’s The Balance.