Drudge launches rare criticism of Fox News: ‘Check your soul in the makeup chair’

Matt Drudge on Monday posted a rare commentary critical of Fox News on Monday, advising hosts of the network’s midday program “Outnumbered” to check their “soul in the makeup chair.”

“A segment on Fox News this morning where hosts laughed and joked their way through a discussion on political impact of terror was bizarre,” Drudge said in a tweet regarding a segment exploring if unity could be achieved following a mass shooting at a Pittsburgh synagogue on Saturday.

“Not even 48 hours since blood flowed at synagogue? Check your soul in the makeup chair!” he added.

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The founder of the conservative news aggregate online site, “The Drudge Report,” also posted a screen shot of Fox Business host Lisa Kennedy Montgomery with an on-screen headline, also known as a chyron, below her reading “Questions on how mail-bomb scare, synagogue attack could impact voters eight days from now.”

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{mosads}Montgomery said during the segment that tragedies no longer unite the nation the way they used to, citing the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks as an example.

“Sadly, tragedy isn’t even bringing us together anymore. It used to be, unfortunately, a unifying factor,” Kennedy said in response to a question about whether divisions in the country can be healed. “And we all remember how the country, and in places like New York City, how people came together following 9/11, and watching vigils in other parts of the world as they prayed for us and prayed for our country to heal, and it feels like we’ve lost part of that.”

“What I will say: Try becoming a member of a third party for a little while,” the libertarian host added to laughter from the panel. “You’ll see what it feels like to lose every single election and still walk around with a smile on your face.”

“Hysterical!” wrote Drudge, who rarely tweets from his personal account and usually deletes messages within 24 hours, in a third post.

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Fox News in a statement to The Hill said there was “absolutely no joking and laughing” about the shooting itself and a screen grab of Montgomery “was hardly indicative” of the substance of the segment.

“Kennedy made an unrelated quip at the end of the segment which was focused on unity – there was absolutely no joking or laughing about the events of this weekend and a screen grab of her smiling is hardly indicative of the entire segment,” reads the statement. “The lower third should not have been up for the duration of this segment as it was not fully reflective of what the panelists were discussing.”

–Updated at 2:37 p.m.