A few weeks back, The New York Times looked at how sales of Hamburger Helper were soaring as the “price of beef and other grocery items are climbing”:

Uncertainty about the economy and higher tariffs levied on goods from a variety of countries have led many consumers to refocus their spending on essentials or items that are good values, while cutting back on extras or unnecessary spending.

“Cost-of-living expenses are up. Eating and drinking expenses are up,” said Sally Lyons Wyatt, who advises packaged food companies at Circana. “Consumers are looking for foods that fill them up for the least amount of money.”

…

For many families, the soaring price of beef has been a particular pressure point. Severe shortages in the U.S. cattle inventory caused ground beef to jump 13 percent in the past year to hit a record high of $6.63 a pound by August, according to the B.L.S. The number of cattle available for beef is at its lowest level since the 1950s, while consumer demand has remained steady, driving up beef costs.

The Times story led to more media coverage. A Fox News article on October 21 reprinted the next day in the New York Post mentioned why the brand was surging:

Eagle Foods said the brand is benefiting today from renewed consumer interest tied to inflation and tighter household budgets.

Mala Wiedemann, an executive vice president at Eagle Foods, said in a previous news release the brand is experiencing a “blockbuster resurgence.”

“Just as in 1971, the brand has become a destination for consumers seeking convenience, bold flavor and affordability amid high inflation, rising beef prices, unemployment concerns and increasing demands on multi-earner households,” she said.

Courtney Alev, a consumer financial advocate at Intuit Credit Karma, noted the Hamburger Helper comeback “says a lot about how consumers are coping with the rising cost of groceries.”

 “When budgets are tight, families often turn to meals that stretch further without sacrificing comfort,” Alev told Fox News Digital.

…

The California-based expert said Credit Karma data shows that 77% of Americans cite grocery prices as the steepest increase they've experienced in recent years.

A surge in purchases of “stretch meals” — meals that make groceries go a bit further — is a “clear signal” that consumers are feeling the pressure, Alev said. 

While we could quibble with what context about rising prices is included in the Fox story as opposed to the Times story (or all the other stories), a Fox News October 22 on-air discussion of Hamburger Helper had none of the context about rising prices, and instead turned into a discussion of co-hosts being nostalgic for casserole they had in the past. (Harris Faulkner even appeared nostalgic for the Hamburger Helper logo, somehow.) Kayleigh McEnany concluded the segment by removing any doubt, noting that the hosts had “some nostalgia going on here."

Let’s wind the clocks back a year to August 2024. After a live report from a Fox personality inside a grocery store, Fox News interviewed Republican Rep. Mike Rulli, who said of grocery prices under the Biden administration:

“Well, you were better off underneath President Trump, not underneath a Harris administration. And let me explain for a second. The mom that used to buy porterhouse or an English rump roast is now buying ground beef and Hamburger Helper. She used to buy Bounty paper towels. Now she's buying generic paper towels, and it just goes on and on and on.”

Indeed it does just go on and on.

The fact of the matter is that grocery prices are rising for the American people and Fox News personalities have no answer other than nostalgic distractions.

Fox News star Laura Ingraham spent years railing against the purported corruption caused by the business interests of President Joe Biden’s son. But now she’s going into business with Donald Trump Jr. in a wildly and obviously unethical conflict of interest that no credible news outlet would tolerate. 

Ingraham and Trump Jr. are among the directors of “Colombier Acquisition Corp. III,” a special-purpose acquisition company which is seeking to raise $260 million in an initial public offering in order to acquire another company, according to a registration statement filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday and first reported by Bloomberg. The firm’s CEO is Omeed Malik, co-founder and managing partner of the venture capital firm 1789 Capital, which invests in companies aligned with the MAGA movement and has “grown into a financial powerhouse” since November, when Trump was elected president and his son became a partner. 

During the Biden administration, Ingraham regularly claimed that the business deals of Hunter Biden implicated Joe Biden in rampant corruption. A few short years later and President Trump’s son is overseeing a business empire which includes not only the venture capital funding through 1789 Capital but also foreign real estate deals; massive crypto investments; and nebulous advisory roles with several companies. 

No credible news outlet would allow a conflict of interest of this magnitude. But don’t expect the Fox brass to step in: Once you’ve put the president’s daughter-in-law on the payroll and given her an hour a week to produce propaganda for the administration, you’ve acknowledged that you are in a different line of work.

• This week, President Donald Trump commuted the prison sentence of disgraced former Rep. George Santos (R-NY). In response, Conservative Political Action Conference Chairman Matt Schlapp said, “I’m not saying George Santos is a Santos, is a saint. But what I’m saying is that he’s no more guilty than 40% of the people that are over there.”

October 9 marked one month of “Operation Midway Blitz,” the Trump administration’s effort to target and harass immigrant communities in Chicago with military-style raids and violent enforcement to advance its mass deportation plans. Fox News has responded by celebrating and justifying the violence Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have unleashed on Chicago residents regardless of citizenship or immigration status. 

Fox inaugurated the operation by embedding a reporter with ICE agents in a move reminiscent of the height of the global war on terror, signaling to its audience that Chicago was a battlefield that required a militarized crackdown. Over the subsequent four weeks, Fox dutifully fulfilled that expectation with coverage that painted civic resistance to ICE as proof that Trump’s authoritarian tactics were needed, while simultaneously whitewashing the agency’s worst abuses. 

Media Matters’ John Knefel wrote this great piece detailing how Fox supported the administration’s authoritarian efforts in Chicago, which are a chilling example of what may be coming for other American citizens. 

The Trump administration has also surged federal immigration and police forces, the National Guard, and the military into Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, Portland, Memphis, Baltimore, New Orleans, San Francisco, and New York City. Many of those cities have already resisted Trump's onslaughts. Wherever he sends forces next, Fox is sure to follow, cheering his administration along the way.

• Just hours after New York prosecutors charged a pardoned January 6 rioter with threatening to kill House Democratic Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), Donald Trump Jr. told Fox’s Sean Hannity’s audience that “there is no violence from the right.” 
• War Room host Steve Bannon: “All illegal aliens must leave the country. … You’re destroying the American people and our social cohesion.”

• Trump is reportedly demanding that the Department of Justice pay him $230 million in compensation for federal investigations into his behavior. Newsmax’s Greg Kelly said Trump has a “great case.”

The election for New York City’s mayor is on November 4 and right-wing media are in panic mode. Since Mayor Eric Adams dropped out of the race, the top polling candidates are Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani, former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, and Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa. Polling shows Mamdani with a significant lead in the race. 

Since Mamdani won the Democratic nomination, right-wing media have been on a crusade against him, particularly attacking his Muslim identity. Those attacks are continuing. This week, Fox’s Will Cain said Mamdani is “hiding the ball a little bit on how he feels about Islam and its relationship to government.” Podcaster Megyn Kelly also said this week that Mamdani is “someone who I actually believe doesn’t give a shit that we were attacked by Muslim terrorists on 9/11.” 

Some right-wing media figures are now also calling on Sliwa to drop out of the race. 

• The Daily Wire’s Ben Shapiro: “I like Curtis [Sliwa]. Curtis is wonderful. Curtis, drop out. Enough. You’re not winning.” 
• Newsmax’s Rob Finnerty: “Republicans are in this really uncomfortable spot of having to publicly call on Curtis Swila [Sliwa], the Republican nominee, someone who deeply cares about New York City, to drop out of the race.” 
• On Newsmax, Michael Savage said Sliwa “has no management experience. He could never manage a budget of the size of New York. So that leaves us with one choice only, and that is the corrupt old guard Democrat type of machine politician Cuomo.” 

Not all right-wing pundits are calling on Sliwa to drop out. Fox’s Sean Hannity said on Wednesday that it’s “unfair” to put all the blame on Sliwa if Mamdani wins.