Why Trump chose CNN for his Town Hall

Why Trump chose CNN for his Town Hall | GZERO World

Does former president Donald Trump’s CNN Town Hall have anything to do with Fox News? Rumored 2024 GOP presidential candidate Chris Christie thinks the answer is a resounding yes.

On GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, the former governor of New Jersey theorized that Trump is holding his first televised discussion with 2024 voters on CNN to give a ratings boost to Fox’s principal competitor and punish the network for settling the recent lawsuit with Dominion Voting Systems.

In settling the lawsuit, Fox News recognized that “certain claims” about Dominion’s voting machines that it repeated during news broadcasts weren’t true, contradicting the lies Trump has been repeating about the 2020 election being rigged.

The town hall will also be a test for moderator Kaitlan Collins, who covered the Trump White House as CNN’s chief White House correspondent in 2021. Democrats worry about Trump repeating misinformation on air, Republicans wonder if it’s even possible he’ll be given a fair shake on CNN.

“There's no question that this is Donald Trump's response to Fox having settled the Dominion Voting Systems case,” Chris Christie tells Ian Bremmer, “In the end I hope that what Fox has learned from this is that authenticity matters and that people should be on the air saying what they really believe.”

Watch the full interview on the upcoming episode of GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, airing on US public television nationwide. Check local listings.

More from GZERO Media

Members of the armed wing of Nelson Mandela's African National Congress line up waiting to vote in a military base north of Pretoria, on April 26, 1994.
REUTERS/Corinne Dufka

On April 27, 1994, Black South Africans went to the polls, marking an end to years of white minority rule and the institutionalized racial segregation known as apartheid. But the “rainbow nation” still faces many challenges, with racial equality and economic development remaining out of reach.

"Patriots" on Broadway: The story of Putin's rise to power | GZERO Reports

Putin was my mistake. Getting rid of him is my responsibility.” It’s clear by the time the character Boris Berezovsky utters that chilling line in the new Broadway play “Patriots” that any attempt to stop Russian President Vladimir Putin’s rise would be futile, perhaps even fatal. The show opened for a limited run in New York on April 22.

TITLE PLACEHOLDER | GZERO US Politics

Campus protests are a major story this week over the Israeli operation in Gaza and the Biden administration's support for it. These are leading to accusations of anti-Semitism on college campuses, and things like canceling college graduation ceremonies at several schools. Will this be an issue of the November elections?

The view Thursday night from inside the Columbia University campus gate at 116th Street and Amsterdam in New York City.
Alex Kliment

An agreement late Thursday night to continue talking, disagreeing, and protesting – without divesting or policing – came in stark contrast to the images of hundreds of students and professors being arrested on several other US college campuses on Thursday.

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks with Judge Amy Coney Barrett after she was sworn in as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, U.S. October 26, 2020.
REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

Some of the conservative justices (three of whom were appointed by Trump) expressed concern that allowing former presidents to be criminally prosecuted could present a burden to future commanders-in-chief.

A Palestinian woman inspects a house that was destroyed after an Israeli airstrike in Rafah, April 24, 2024.
Abed Rahim Khatib/Reuters

“We are afraid of what will happen in Rafah. The level of alert is very high,” Ibrahim Khraishi, the Palestinian ambassador to the United Nations, said Thursday.

Haiti's new interim Prime Minister Michel Patrick Boisvert holds a glass with a drink after a transitional council took power with the aim of returning stability to the country, where gang violence has caused chaos and misery, on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince, Haiti April 25, 2024.
REUTERS/Pedro Valtierra

Haiti’s Prime Minister Ariel Henry formally resigned on Thursday as a new transitional body charged with forming the country’s next government was sworn in.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrives at the Beijing Capital International Airport, in Beijing, China, April 25, 2024.
Mark Schiefelbein/Pool via REUTERS

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken brought up concerns over China's support for Russia with his counterpart Wang Yi in Beijing on Friday, before meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Flags from across the divide wave in the air over protests at Columbia University on Thursday, April 25, 2024.
Alex Kliment

Of the many complex, painful issues contributing to the tension stemming from the Oct. 7 Hamas massacre and the ongoing Israeli attacks in Gaza, dividing groups into two basic camps, pro-Israel and pro-Palestine, is only making this worse. GZERO Publisher Evan Solomon explains the need to solve this category problem.