Fox News host Bret Baier defended his colleague after President Donald Trump posted on Truth Social panning his show’s segment on the latest Iran war news.
Trump posted on social media on Thursday evening telling Baier to “straighten out his flunkies,” while calling the Iran report from Fox News correspondent Jonathan Hunt “particularly inaccurate.” Trump took issue with the network’s characterization of the state of negotiations between the regime and the Trump administration, saying of the Iranian regime, “I don’t want to meet, they do. In fact, they are begging to make a deal.”
Baier addressed Trump’s Truth Social post on the airwaves and insisted that Hunt’s report on his show, Special Report with Bret Baier, was, indeed, accurate.
“First of all, Jonathan Hunt’s not a flunky. He’s a great reporter. Second of all, Mr. President, we didn’t say you wanted to meet. In fact, we played a sound bite that you didn’t want to meet and there are no negotiations,” Baier said on air in response to the president.
“We said that Treasury Secretary [Scott] Bessent is hoping to meet with G20 countries to increase the pressure on Iran, and that Gulf state allies, including Qatar, are inside Tehran trying to get Iran to agree to concessions. That’s what we said,” Baier continued.
In Baier’s initial segment on Iran, he began the report saying, “As regional allies work to broker a deal, President Trump says there are no new negotiations going on between the U.S. and Iran.” Later in the segment, Hunt spoke to Bessent’s negotiations with leaders of G20 nations in North Carolina.
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“With lines at gas stations another sign that Iran’s economy is being squeezed, the treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, hopes to persuade G20 countries to increase that pressure still further when he meets with them over the weekend in North Carolina. The administration’s hope is that eventually the Iranian leadership will capitulate and compromise. But for now, that isn’t happening,” Hunt said.
As the Trump administration has put peace negotiations with Iran on ice, its strategy has shifted toward amping up the economic pressure on Iran. The administration has broadened its Treasury sanctions on the Islamic regime while also increasing pressure on Iran’s business partners.