Fox News reporter Geraldo Rivera was caught on a hot mic late Tuesday blasting Bernie Sanders’s win in West Virginia’s Democratic presidential primary.
“So annoying — this guy is so annoying,” he said of Sanders as the independent Vermont senator made his victory speech in Salem, Ore.
{mosads}“Your mic is hot,” fellow Fox News personality Sean Hannity told Rivera. “What are you saying?”
“He’s so annoying,” Rivera added. “People that think his supporters are going to go to Donald Trump are smoking dope.”
Rivera’s assessment drew laughter and an exclamation of “what?” from the other assembled Fox News journalists.
Reporter Eric Bolling then countered Rivera by pointing to Sanders’s popularity with Trump’s supporters in West Virginia.
“One of the most important things coming out of tonight, Sean, is not who won West Virginia, not who won Nebraska — the most important thing for me that came out of tonight is that exit polling shows that 43 percent of Bernie Sanders voters would vote for Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton,” he said.
“That’s a massive number,” Bolling added. “There’s an opportunity for Donald Trump to take Bernie Sanders voters.”
Sanders on Tuesday won West Virginia’s Democratic primary, while Trump, facing no opposition, won the GOP contest.
Exit polling on Tuesday found that 44 percent of Sanders’s supporters in West Virginia would back Trump over Clinton in a general presidential election. One-third of voters identified as being independents, according to exit polling.
Only 24 percent said they would support the Democratic presidential front-runner, while 31 percent said they would back neither Clinton nor Trump next fall.