Gloria Borger Says GOP Source Told Her Trump Canceled Jan. 6 Event to Avoid Poor Ratings: ‘This Could Look Bad’
CNN analyst Gloria Borger said on Wednesday that former President Donald Trump canceled his planned Jan. 6 press conference because he feared few would watch it.
Trump had scheduled what was billed as a major press event from his Mar-a-Lago estate in south Florida for Thursday, the anniversary of the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol.
On Tuesday, the former president nixed the event from his schedule through a last-minute statement.
In the statement, Trump blamed the cancelation on “the total bias and dishonesty of the January 6th Unselect Committee of Democrats, two failed Republicans, and the Fake News Media.”
“I am canceling the January 6th Press Conference at Mar-a-Lago on Thursday, and instead will discuss many of those important topics at my rally on Saturday, January 15th, in Arizona—It will be a big crowd!”
Borger joined AC360 to discuss the event and its sudden cancelation. Host Anderson Cooper theorized that Trump might have canceled the press conference after being advised to do so by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and following comments from Fox News host Laura Ingraham.
On The Ingraham Angle on Monday, Ingraham inferred that Jan. 6 might not be the best day for Trump to hold a press conference during an interview with Rep Jim Banks (R-IN).
But Borger shared a theory of her own and suggested Trump was concerned the event would get poor ratings:
Well, first of all, he loves the attention. But I think he canceled ‘cause he thought he wasn’t going to get enough of it. He was going to be embarrassed. Because I was told today by a Republican source with knowledge that the president when he heard that the networks weren’t going to take it live, that cable networks weren’t going to take it live, sort of said, “Wait a minute, I’m not going to get the attention that I want and this could look bad for me.”
He had been warned by people, you really shouldn’t be doing this now, maybe it would be in bad taste, not that he cares about that. But, that it wasn’t going to make the splash that he thought it was going to make. So, in the end, and maybe his lawyers, by the way, told him you know, “It’s probably not a good idea for you to go talk about this publicly right now,” although, he’s going to do it in a rally sometime soon. But I think it wasn’t the people that got to him. His supporters who got to him. It was the fact that he thought you know what? I’m just not–I’m just not going to get the lights. I’m not gonna get enough.
Watch above, via CNN.
UPDATE 11:12 p.m. EST: This post has been updated to clarify that Laura Ingraham did not advise Trump personally that holding a press conference on Jan. 6 might not be a good idea, but that she inferred it on her Fox News show earlier this week.
