As vote counting for the 2020 election dragged into its fourth day, even the “Fox & Friends” hosts seemed to lose track of the time.
“Have a great night,” morning show co-anchor Ainsley Earhardt said after a segment on Friday.
“Great night?” asked co-host Steve Doocy. It’s 4:45 in the morning! Ah, 7:45.”
Doocy’s mix-up was slightly more understandable since clocks in studios and on live cable show graphics can show the times in each time zone where the program is airing. “Fox & Friends” airs on the east and west coasts simultaneously, so 4:45 and 7:45 were both correct.
“This is probably their nighttime,” said Earhardt. “They have to go to bed!”
Meteorologist Janice Dean laughed and asked, “Can we have a drink after this at some point?”
Doocy said it sounded like they already had.
Fatigue isn’t unique to Fox News. All of the major channels have been running round-the-clock coverage of the events since Tuesday, with network stars — from Fox News’ Bill Hemmer to MSNBC’s Steve Kornacki — revealing on-air they’ve barely been sleeping, and for good reason. There is a lot to cover between outstanding mail-in votes in key battleground states and President Donald Trump’s baseless claims that he’s being cheated out of a second term by Democrats and the party’s nominee, Joe Biden.
Fox News has found itself in a quandary after calling Arizona for Joe Biden on Tuesday, the only outlet besides the Associated Press to do so. The network’s electoral vote tally for Biden is much higher than other outlet, so if any remaining state (outside Alaska) is called for him, he will hit the 270 electoral vote threshold for victory.
On Wednesday, “Fox & Friends” got the highest ratings of its 22-year run, pulling in 4.642 million average viewers, of whom an average of 1.039 million were in the advertiser-coveted age demographic of 25 to 54.
Watch below.
Ainsley Earhardt: "Have a great night!"
Steve Doocy: "Great night? It's 4:45 in the morning! Or, 7:45."
Janice Dean: "Can we have a drink after this at some point?" pic.twitter.com/bssIkPuCmM
— Bobby Lewis (@revrrlewis) November 6, 2020