Fox News Totally Ignores GOP Congresswoman-Elect’s Support For QAnon When Covering Her Victory

Republican Mayra Flores won a special election for Texas’ 34th congressional district Tuesday evening, and Fox News programs enthusiastically touted her win. Omitted from the effusive coverage, however, was Flores’ repeated promotion of the QAnon conspiracy theory, and many reports also neglected to mention relevant financial facts about the race.

Flores defeated her Democrat opponent Dan Sanchez by 50.98% to 43.33% to flip a seat previously held by Rep. Filemon Vela (D-TX), who retired at the end of March to join the lobbying and law firm Akin Gump.

The special election was conducted using the old boundaries for the South Texas district, which as the Cook Political Report’s Dave Wasserman noted, was won by President Joe Biden by a narrow margin of 4 points in 2020. Flores will represent the district for a few months and then have to win re-election this fall to retain the seat when a new congressional term starts in January 2023. That midterm election will be a far more uphill path for her, as the redistricted lines will be Biden +15 and have a Cook rating of Lean D.

According to the Texas Tribune, Flores had a massive financial advantage over Sanchez, with Democrats seemingly reluctant to open their wallets to capture a congressional seat for only a few months, preferring to temporarily concede and wait for the easier contest in November.

The latest FEC data showed Flores collected over $1,096,000 in contributions while Sanchez got just slightly more than $46,000 (Sanchez also loaned his campaign $100,000, funds that remain in the campaign account untouched and presumably available to repay himself).

Outside spending was similarly lopsided, with GOP groups pouring in about half a million dollars in pro-Flores television ads alone, along with hundreds of thousands of dollars going into digital ads and grassroots support. National Democratic groups popped in late, after early voting started, with the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee helping Sanchez’s campaign pay for a $100,000 digital ad campaign and the House Majority PAC making a $115,000 television ad buy.

A significant portion of that Democratic messaging attacked Flores as a QAnon-supporting extremist candidate, and she sought to distance herself from the conspiracy theory, which baselessly claims various Democrats and liberal celebrities are engaged in Satanic ritualized sexual abuse and murder of children. “I’ve always been against any of that,” Flores said during a San Antonio Express-News interview in April. “I’ve never been supportive of it.”

“But that doesn’t really match up with reality,” wrote Vice’s David Gilbert, noting how Flores had used QAnon-related hashtags and slogans in multiple social media posts on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, including several paid Facebook ads. Liberal watchdog group Media Matters previously documented examples of Flores’ posts in a comprehensive report on dozens of QAnon-supporting congressional candidates across the country that has been updated throughout the past year.

It appears that the Hispanic Outreach Chairwomen for the Hidalgo County, Texas, Republican Party ran a Facebook ad a few days ago with multiple QAnon hashtags in it. pic.twitter.com/4qDMsQPVgO

— Alex Kaplan (@AlKapDC) May 4, 2020

Flores was endorsed by former President Donald Trump and also won over SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, who tweeted that his vote for Flores was the “first time I ever voted Republican.” Her victory also drew praise from a parade of Fox News anchors, hosts, contributors, and guests who lauded her win as a positive sign for the GOP, but none of whom we could find acknowledging Flores’ QAnon comments, and the majority of whom skipped over the financial disparities between the candidates.

To be clear, support for QAnon is not some ancient or youthful indiscretion; the conspiracy theory first arose during the Trump presidency in an October 2017 4chan post, with merchandise being widely available on Amazon by 2018 and the movement achieving international reach in the lead up to the 2020 election. Some of Flores’ QAnon posts are from a mere two years ago and her dishonestly claim to “never” have supported QAnon offers little assurance.

A search in the media monitoring service Snapstream for simply the word “QAnon” in the transcripts of all Fox News channel programs brings up zero mentions Tuesday or Wednesday. In fact, the only recent citation of Flores’ QAnon posts in the Fox universe, to the best of our knowledge, came as an incidental mention Tuesday on Neil Cavuto’s Fox Business Network program, which airs at noon ET.

On any given hour, FBN draws in a fraction of viewers as their big brother FNC. While the business network’s ratings average in the hundreds of thousands, Cavuto’s 4 pm ET show on FNC drew over 1.4 million total viewers in recent ratings, the evening opinion shows on FNC regularly bring in around 2 million viewers, and ratings champ Tucker Carlson gets over 3 million.

On Cavuto’s FBN show Tuesday, reporter Alicia Acuna covered the special election, a little less than 10 hours before Wasserman would call the race for Flores. Acuna described it as a “traditionally Democratic district” that “thanks to redistricting” would be “even more Democratic come November,” but the GOP was “hoping that it will signal that momentum is actually on their side.”

She commented that Flores had benefitted from attention and money from Republican allies, and that Sanchez was being “significantly outspent by Flores with national Democrats looking more toward November.” The Congressional Hispanic Caucus PAC, reported Acuna, had “labeled Flores a QAnon-loving, hate-mongering Republican.” Acuna did not mention that Flores had actually posted comments with QAnon hashtags and slogans, or say “QAnon” at all during the rest of her report.

Acuna at least acknowledged, albeit only indirectly, that Flores was being criticized over QAnon. Mentions of her QAnon support were not to be found in Fox News’ coverage, and the financially-lopsided campaigns and shifting district lines that provided important context to this election came up only rarely, deemphasized as Fox personalities touted Flores as a beacon of hope for Republicans’ midterm ambitions.

Below, a sampling of video clips and quotes:

The Ingraham Angle, Tuesday 10:00 pm ET

Host Laura Ingraham broke the news of Flores’ win near the end of her program, bringing in former Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway for reaction.

Democrats had tried to attack Flores “as an ultra-MAGA right-wing extremist,” said Conway, “and of course they’re going to call her a sexist and a racist.” Flores’ win was a harbinger of the “big red wave coming,” she continued, and an end to Democrats thinking “they own the Hispanic vote” and can win by “taking a semi-crappy idea out of English and translate it to Spanish.”

Fox News at Night with Shannon Bream, Wednesday 12:00 am ET

Shannon Bream introduced Bret Baier to discuss what she called a “very interesting” and “bellwether” election.

“This is a really big deal” and “a major bellwether,” agreed Baier. He played a clip from one of Flores’ campaign ads. Her victory, said Baier, was a “canary in the coal mine” for Democrats’ ability to win Hispanic votes.

Fox & Friends First, Wednesday 5:00 am ET

Anchor Carley Shimkus called Flores’ victory a “huge win” and “a major breakthrough for the Republican party in Texas.” Her co-anchor Todd Piro said it was “a shot of momentum for Republicans” and a signal of “major GOP gains among Latino voters with midterms around the corner.”

Griff Jenkins offered a breakdown of the previous night’s primary elections, highlighting Flores’ resume as the wife of a Border Patrol agent and daughter of legal immigrants, the first Mexican-born candidate elected to Congress, and her win in a “Democratic stronghold” county. Flores “is the perfect person to lead this Republican shift,” said Jenkins, and “a success story in it its own right” and leading on the issue of immigration, “which may define many of the races in November.”

Shimkus added that Flores “broke a glass ceiling” as the first Mexican-born member of Congress, and “we’ll have to wait and see if she makes any magazine covers, but I wouldn’t hold my breath on that one, but she deserves it.”

In a second Fox & Friends First segment, Piro called Flores’ win “history made in South Texas,” and Shimkus brought up Musk’s tweet endorsing her.

Fox News contributor and former Rep. Sean Duffy (R-WI) said Musk’s story of voting Republican for the first time was the story of a lot of voters in South Texas and a sign of the erosion of support for Biden among Hispanics. The economy was “horrible,” added Duffy, and Democrats’ social views, which included “trying to teach our children transgenderism,” were issues that “don’t resonate with the Hispanic community.”

Piro replied that the “Democratic sense of entitlement to the Latino vote could be officially dead.”

Fox & Friends, Wednesday 6:00 pm ET

“We may be witnessing a seismic shift among Hispanic voters in South Texas,” said Jenkins, cuing up a video clip of Flores addressing supporters on Election Night.

Another segment covered Musk’s tweet, and then at the top of the 7:00 am ET and 8:00 am ET hours Jenkins was brought back to share his “big takeaways” about Tuesday’s election results, including similarly positive comments about Flores.

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) joined the show around 8:30 am ET to discuss the election, and slammed Democrats for “claim[ing] to speak for Hispanics,” but not recognizing that Hispanics “don’t want to pay $5 for gas, they don’t want violent criminals running the streets, they don’t want their schools trying to convince their son he’s their daughter.”

America’s Newsr0om, Wednesday 9:00 am ET

Flores “put the border on the ballot,” said anchor Bill Hemmer. “We are living through a political realignment,” said Dana Perino. Acuna said Flores won with a message of “conservative values and accusing the Democrats of ignoring Latinos.”

At the top of the 10:00 am ET hour, Hemmer called Flores’ win “the political story of the day, maybe of the week, maybe of the month” and “stunning stuff.”

The Faulkner Focus, Wednesday 11:00 am ET

Pete Hegseth told guest anchor Shannon Smith that Flores’ race was “immensely important” because it showed the fallacy of the Democrats’ “racist assumption” they could count on Hispanic votes, but their policies were “driving that voting block away in droves, and into the arms of the guy who said he would build the wall and make Mexico pay for it.” (Note, Mexico is not paying for the wall.)

Outnumbered, Wednesday 12:oo pm ET

Kayleigh McEnany called Flores’ win “an enormous victory.” Kellyanne Conway mocked Democrats, saying “they never really learn,” and don’t understand “what motivated this woman to run.” McEnany agreed that Flores was “absolutely the name of the day.”

Julie Banderas suggested that any Democrat seeking to challenge Flores “might as well throw in your resignation letter now,” because “you are screwed.” Flores was “a perfect example of how Hispanics are turning their back on Democrats and any politician who is soft on border security.”

America Reports, Wednesday 1:00 pm ET

Anchor Sandra Smith introduced the segment describing the election as a “huge win for Republicans…flipping the blue seat to red.”

Acuna provided one of the few mentions on Fox News of the financial imbalance in the race, with national and state Republicans pouring more than $1 million into the district and national Democrats staying largely on the sidelines.

Anchor Trace Gallagher called Flores’ win a “pretty big shift” and brought in Karl Rove, who concurred with that description and added comments about South Texas Hispanics feeling “increasingly disaffected” with the national Democratic party.

Rove also scoffed at Sanchez’s criticism of his party for not providing him more monetary support, and said it was a “phony excuse” for Democrats to claim they lost only because they are waiting to invest in the fall, citing examples of them spending millions to promote extremist GOP candidates they think will be easier to beat.

Gallagher mentioned how the Democrats were “painting [Flores] as a MAGA extremist” but that “doesn’t seem to be working” in that district. Rove replied that Flores won “because they got a chance to know who she is.”

“She’s a healthcare professional,” said Rove, “she’s the wife of a Border Patrol [agent], she knows what she believes, she’s the daughter of a south Texas Democrat, so all of this stuff combined to create a very positive image for her, and I know people rallied tremendously to her.”

Watch the video clips above, via Fox News.