• Podcasters are launching volleys of attacks against each other. A sampling of this includes Benny Johnson saying he would “never forgive Ben Shapiro” for defending Jimmy Kimmel; Tim Pool saying, “I wonder if the goal of Tucker [Carlson] is to demoralize;” and Carlson attacking Shapiro. It’s a hot mess in right-wing media podcasting right now. 
• Right-wing media figures are divided over Donald Trump’s promise of $5,000 for every American adult if Republicans maintain control of Congress after this year’s midterm elections. Some figures have claimed Trump’s plan is “creative” and a “bet on the future,” while others are arguing “we can’t afford” the “inflationary” payments and equating the payment to a “bribe.” 
• Ben Shapiro attacked Vice President JD Vance’s closeness with Tucker Carlson, saying, “That is going to come along with a political and yes, a moral cost.” 
• Newsmax host Rob Finnerty on the midterms: “Republicans do not have a great story to tell right now. I’m sorry to tell you that, but it’s true.”

Fox announced last week that longtime anchor Maria Bartiromo has left the network; her attorney has disputed that. As Matt Gertz notes for MS Now, “The central offense that resulted in Fox apparently parting ways with her was that she gave the White House internal Fox News communications about claims Trump was pushing about China and the 2020 election. Rather than encouraging the network’s stars to tell their viewers the truth about the president’s fantasies, Fox executives ordered them not to mention them.”

Steve Bannon, who has ties himself with Bartiromo, hosted White House adviser Peter Navarro. Navarro defiantly admitted that he shared a text from Bartiromo with the White House and told Bannon that Fox News' CEO Suzanne Scott “should prostrate herself before President Trump for disrespecting the office” and “put Maria right back in the anchor chair.”

Perhaps one has jumped on this story more than people on air at Newsmax.

Host Bob Brooks said Baritormo’s ouster suggests that Fox has moved further to the left, while host Rob Finnerty said Fox has a history of firing “very big Trump supporters.” Greg Kelly agreed that Fox is “anti-Trump."

Newsmax is always happy to attack a competitor, but there may be more here than a petty rivalry. The Dominion case revealed that Fox News paid very close attention to how Newsmax tried to attack it from the right, and it reacted accordingly when it started to lose viewers. Should something similar happen again — say, if Republicans lose seats in the midterms and Fox acknowledges them while Newsmax says otherwise, and Fox's audience prefers the Newsmax narrative — Fox would be in the same bind it was in 2020. That is a hypothetical of course and there are numerous other ways this all may play out. Either way, this situation is worth keeping an eye on.

• Vice President JD Vance used his keynote address to the GOP’s midterm convention to echo one of Tucker Carlson’s most infamous statements, just one week after publicly refusing to distance himself from the right-wing podcaster.
• Wayne Allyn Root, a right-wing media figure in Trump’s orbit who has spent years spreading conspiracy theories, is trying to advance a plot to subvert the upcoming midterm elections based on outlandish legal reasoning and expansive theories of presidential authority. Check out Media Matters’ John Knefel’s great piece for more information. 
• A Fox Business contributor claimed people don’t give Trump enough credit for keeping gasoline prices down.

After six months, President Donald Trump’s war with Iran has failed to accomplish any discernable objective with senior U.S. military leaders reportedly warning of the dangers a long-term conflict may bring. But on Fox News — the MAGA propaganda network that urged Trump to attack Iran in the first place — some of his most devoted allies have all but completely stopped talking about the war. 

Fox’s evening “opinion” shows dramatically reduced their coverage of the Iran war over the summer, as the conflict they initially celebrated as a historic success became ever more intractable and unpopular. As hosts tamped down their discussions of the war, they focused instead on more palatable culture-war fare. 

Media Matters found that mentions of Iran on Fox’s five evening shows fell 78% from June to August. Meanwhile, the five shows mentioned culture war topics such as “socialism,” the “WNBA,” or “Fauci” six times more frequently than the actual war. 

When they do talk about the war, Fox hosts claim that victory is imminent, or that it’s already happened. Meanwhile, Trump has reportedly been told that the war could last into 2029. 

Media Matters’ Matt Gertz has this great analysis of how Fox has been downplaying the war the network helped to start.

Since the beginning of Trump’s war with Iran in February, Fox News has attempted to downplay, dismiss, and deflect from the resulting pain at the pump, including by repeatedly claiming that elevated gas prices would be temporary. 

Fox figures have suggested that high energy prices are a necessary “sacrifice” and a “small price to pay” to keep Iran from developing nuclear capabilities; they’ve repeatedly pointed to “Biden high” gas prices; they’ve turned their focus onto California’s fuel costs in order to blame Democrats and climate policies; and they’ve repeatedly claimed that soaring prices were temporary and would come back down as soon as some constantly shifting goal was achieved. In fact, Media Matters found that Fox hosts and guests repeated this last claim at least 188 times from the beginning of war through August. 

As of September 9, the current average price of regular gasoline in the U.S. is $4.22 per gallon.

Fox presented a clear narrative that a return to pre-war gas prices was imminent, even as the timeframe for when viewers could expect that return moved ever further away and as experts repeatedly cautioned about the long-term impact of the conflict on energy prices.