Fox News anchors Megyn Kelly, Bret Baier, and Chris Wallace, who moderated the Mar. 3 Republican debate in Detroit, turned the event into a veritable fact-checking session, focused on front-runner Donald Trump.
The trio spent the vast majority of the allotted two hours questioning the New York real estate mogul on multiple fronts–from his proposal to cut funds to the Department of Education and the Environmental Protection Agency, to his alleged off-the-record comments to the New York Times editorial board.
The news organization had even crafted graphics to dispute some of Trump’s past comments, and had video clips on hand to refute statements Trump made.
Megyn Kelly, with whom Trump has clashed publicly before, was particularly focused on the veracity, or not, of Trump’s statements. She countered Trump’s claim his Trump University got an “A” grade from the Better Business Bureau —currently facing multiple lawsuits—by citing the most recent grade, a “D-“.
She pulled up another graphic that quoted a plaintiff in the case against Trump U that called him a “con artist”:
Later, Chris Wallace pushed back when Trump denied he had warm feelings for Russian president Vladimir Putin, by showing a video of the candidate saying, “I think I’d get along with Vladimir Putin.”
Moderators also asked Trump to explain why he said in his autobiography that he supported a ban on assault weapons, despite his recent praise for the National Rifle Association. Trump replied “I don’t support it anymore.”
At one point Kelly asked Trump, “You change your tune on so many things, and that has some people saying, ‘What is his core?’” Trump responded, “Megyn, I have a very strong core, but I’ve never seen a successful person who wasn’t flexible.”