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Fox News spent nearly as much time covering Donald Trump's anti-transgender executive orders as CNN and MSNBC combined, according to a new report from Media Matters.
To conservatives who are tired of hearing about trans people: The call is coming from inside the house.
The numbers don't lie — Fox News has an unhealthy obsession with transgender people.
Fox News spent nearly as much time covering Donald Trump's anti-transgender executive orders as CNN and MSNBC combined, according to a new report from Media Matters. Fox News covered the orders for a total of four hours and eight minutes, compared to MSNBC's two hours and 33 minutes and CNN's two hours and nine minutes.
All three cable networks spent about the same amount of time covering the issue on their news shows, but Fox News overtook all other cable news coverage of the topic on its opinion shows, which accounted for 28 percent of all coverage of the anti-trans executive orders across the networks.
“Fox News has used its platform to push inflammatory and misleading narratives about trans people for years," Media Matters LGBTQ Program Director Ari Drennen told The Advocate. "After President Trump signed multiple executive orders targeting the trans community, Fox treated these anti-trans actions as culture war fodder, which fuels dangerous rhetoric and harmful misconceptions that lead to real discrimination."
In just his first weeks in office, Trump signed executive ordersdenying the existence of transgender people, attempting to ban gender-affirming care for those under 19,banning trans athletes from teams and facilities that align with their identity, andrevoking 1960s civil rights protections in federal hirings.
Fox News largely focused on Trump’s executive order targeting trans inclusion in women's sports, which accounted for 35 percent of the network's coverage. Overall, coverage of the sports executive order accounted for 51 percent of all segments about Trump’s anti-trans orders across the three networks.
Fox News personalities and guests were also more likely to mention the issue in segments that were about a different topic, "suggesting that Fox viewers were reminded of the orders more often than those of other networks," according to the report.
Out of the 86 guest segments across the three networks that discussed the orders, only 12 segments featured a trans or gender-nonconforming guest (14 percent). CNN aired seven guest segments, MSNBC ran four (two of which featured Rep. Sarah McBride, the first out trans member of Congress), and Fox News featured just one guest segment with Caitlyn Jenner contributing.
Out of the 22 segments about the order restricting gender-affirming care, not a single one included a trans or gender-nonconforming guest regardless of network.
“Our study shows that Fox News, specifically its opinion shows, dominated cable news coverage of Trump's anti-trans executive orders. But this isn’t just about the volume of airtime — it’s about how coverage is framed, and Fox has a history of pushing false and baseless narratives about trans people," Drennen continued. "CNN and MSNBC shouldn’t allow Fox and others in right-wing media to dominate coverage of stories that have real-world consequences, and they must also include the perspective of those being harmed.”
