Fox News' Bret Baier says Trump's divisiveness could play a key role in 2024 election

Although recent polls show former President Donald Trump edging the lead away from President Joe Biden, Fox News’ chief political anchor Bret Baier told a Palm Beach audience this week that Trump’s divisiveness could be a critical issue in the outcome of the 2024 presidential campaign.

Trump’s polarization with voters has led them to view him through one of two lenses, either focusing on his policies or “the things that he does that come off as crazy,” including "maybe" his reaction to the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol in 2021, said Baier, who has been affiliated with Fox News for 26 years.

“It’s a real conundrum as far as (his) campaign trying to figure out where his pitch is,” Baier said Tuesday during a sold-out talk at the Society of the Four Arts’ Walter S. Gubelmann Auditorium.

About 440 people came to hear Baier, a Palm Beach homeowner who hosts the weeknight show “Special Report with Bret Baier.”

His talk coincided with Fox News' announcement that Baier and anchor Martha MacCallum will host a Jan. 10 Iowa Town Hall event with Trump, five days before the state’s caucuses.

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Fox News' Bret Baier recalls losing a round of golf to Donald Trump

Baier traced Trump’s divisiveness to his ambition to win. To illustrate his point, he recounted a time he had played golf with Trump prior to his election in 2016.

Doing a Trump impression, Baier detailed how Trump made a $10 bet that he would finish ahead of Baier. Halfway through the round and five strokes up, Baier thought that he had the victory clinched, but Trump slowly climbed back, all the while gloating he’d end up winning.

He did.

Baier said he then interviewed Trump in 2016, six days before Election Day. After the interview, he asked Trump how he planned on winning, considering polling at the time had him losing to Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.

“’Bret, we are going to win — remember the golf cart ride to the clubhouse?’” Baier recalled Trump saying. “Six days before the general election, he wants to shove it in my face. … I think that’s pretty indicative that it’s all about the ’W’ (win) — (it) doesn’t matter how you get there.”

Though Trump may lead at this time, Baier said “a lot can change,” especially considering the scope of Trump’s current legal battles.

“I don’t think that we fully know how the legal stuff is going to transpire for independent (voters) and suburban women,” Baier said. “I do know how it's playing out in (his) base and the Republican Party, and that is his numbers are going up and his fundraising is going up.”

The situation is different from Trump’s 2016 campaign, in which Baier described him as a candidate who offered an unexpected alternative to traditional choices.

Baier, who said he has worked through 10 election cycles, characterized Trump’s 2016 victory as unlike anything he had seen.

“I was sitting next to (Fox’s) Meghyn Kelly, Brit Hume and Chris Wallace and we just sat there for a second and looked at it and went ‘Wow, that’s pretty amazing,’ ” he said. “Because it wasn’t something picked up on in the polls.”

The election showed there had been a “whole bunch of folks” that had been ignored by pollsters, Baier said, although he acknowledged that public opinion toward Trump changed during and after his presidency.

“Now, I think, things changed in 2020," he said, adding that the arrival of the coronavirus pandemic “really threw a wrench in the whole thing,” referring to the effectiveness of Trump’s presidency.

During his appearance, Baier chose not to analyze the other Republican primary candidates, instead making a passing remark about Nikki Haley’s New Hampshire campaign. He mentioned the candidacy of Gov. Ron DeSantis only in passing while discussing the upcoming Iowa caucus.

"Polls can be wrong, Iowa is always about caucus goers," he said.

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In Palm Beach, Bret Baier of Fox calls Biden a 'weak incumbent'

But Baier did analyze Biden, labeling the president as a “weak incumbent” and citing a recent USA Today/ Suffolk University Poll that found the president losing support from traditional Democratic bases, most notably Hispanics and younger voters.

“Trump leads 37% to 33% among voters under 35. These are young voters who last time went overwhelming to Biden in 2020,” he said. “Biden trails Trump in Hispanic voters 39% to 34%. In 2020 Biden won that group 65% to 52%.”

He also described how a viable third-party candidate could affect the race: “Overall Biden trails Donald Trump by 37% to 39%, but 17% said they would support an unnamed third-party candidate over those two,” Baier said. “If some third-party candidate got 17% to 20%, that’ll really shake up the race, and most likely take from President Biden, if you do the math right now.”

Baier pointed to immigration, crime rates and inflation as issues that are dampening Biden’s approval rating.

“Even though the economy by numbers is doing well, well, there is a feeling that it isn’t doing great,” he said.

Fox's Bret Baier, wife Amy have owned a home in Palm Beach since 2021

Baier also discussed current foreign policy issues, including the Israel-Hamas War, which he said had been difficult to cover because of the graphic videos and the mounting death toll.

He spoke about Israel’s efforts to normalize relations with neighboring Arab states, and mentioned his interviews with Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Both men signaled support for normalization, he said.

Responding to a question from the audience, Baier said he doesn't imagine Biden would replace Vice President Kamala Harris as his running mate. But there is no clear front-runner for Trump’s vice presidential choice should he become the Republican nominee, Baier said.

“As for President Trump, there are a lot of people that are pushing for Nikki Haley to be vice president,” he said. “That group is not welcomed in ’Trump World’ currently.”

He said former Secretary of Housing and Development Ben Carson, a Palm Beach County resident, or South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott may be other options for the Republican second-in-command seat.

Baier and his wife, Amy, have owned property in Palm Beach since 2021, when they purchased a house on Fairview Road from fashion designer Tommy Hilfiger and his wife, Dee Ocleppo Hilfiger, for a recorded $12 million. Recently, the couple upsized when Baier paid a recorded $37 million for an ocean-block house at 125 Wells Road. The Fairview Road property is listed for sale.

Palm Beach, he said, has offered the Baiers a welcome respite in a stressful world. “When we come over that bridge, the blood pressure just goes down a little bit,” he said.

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Diego Diaz Lasa is a journalist at the Palm Beach Daily News, part of the USA TODAY Florida Network. You can reach him at dlasa@pbdailynews.com. Help support our journalism. Subscribe today.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Daily News: Fox News host says Trump's divisiveness could be critical in election outcome