Chris Wallace Calls Fact-Checking During Debates 'Terrible' And 'A Very Slippery Slope'

Chris Wallace is sharing his personal thoughts on the practice of fact-checking during presidential debates, arguing that its use in recent onstage sparring matches is “terrible” and “a very slippery slope.”

The veteran news anchor contended this in an interview released Tuesday and recalled one moment during last month’s vice presidential debate when CBS moderator Margaret Brennan fact-checked Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio) for his description of Haitian immigrants.

“And then Vance said, ‘No, you’re wrong,’ and wanted to argue with her about it, and they cut off the mics,” Wallace said on Mediaite’s “Press Club” podcast. “I winced. I thought it was just terrible. And I must say, I took some heat when I said I wasn’t going to fact-check.”

The ex-Fox News anchor famously moderated the third 2016 presidential debate between former President Donald Trump and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and announced on air beforehand that he wasn’t going to fact-check the proceedings.

“That’s not my job,” Wallace said at the time.

“I think my saying at that time, I’m not going to fact-check, stands up pretty well, because you look at what happened with ABC where they backtracked,” he said on “Press Club.” “You look at what happened with CBS. It’s a very slippery slope.”

ABC News declared shortly before September’s presidential debate between Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris that fact-checking wouldn’t dominate the proceedings, as “the debate belongs to the candidates.” CBS reportedly introduced an at-home alternative where viewers could scan on-screen QR codes for fact-checks during Vance and Gov. Tim Walz’s (D-Minn.) debate.

“I guess I really still feel like the obligation is on the other candidate,” Wallace said on the podcast before delivering a bold claim: that “the moderators’ fact-checking sometimes feels to me like virtue signaling.”

“It’s like, ‘I’m going to puff myself up,’” he said.

Wallace famously chose not to fact-check Trump or Clinton during their final 2016 debate.
Wallace famously chose not to fact-check Trump or Clinton during their final 2016 debate. Olivier Douliery/Pool/Getty Images

While the anchor admitted his choice not to fact-check came “before Trump had become president” in “a much more innocent time,” he doubled down and said the decision to do so to a candidate is a subjective act.

“There was one point in the ABC debate where Trump had said, ‘Well, I lost [the 2020 election],’ and [moderator] David Muir asked him about it,” Wallace said. “And Trump said, ‘I was being sarcastic.’ And Muir then said, ‘Well, it didn’t seem to me you were sarcastic.’”

“Really? Now we’re going to fact-check whether a guy was being sarcastic or serious?” he continued.

Toward the end of the interview, Wallace also recalled speaking with the late “PBS NewsHour” anchor Jim Lehrer, who hosted 12 presidential debates, about his thoughts on moderating.

“We had lunch before I did my first debate in 2016,” Wallace said. “And he said, ‘You got to understand, it’s not about you, it’s not about the moderator. And if at the end of the debate, people say, “That was a great debate, was there even a moderator there,” that’s a success.’”

Related...