Chris Wallace pushes back on Fox reporter’s claim that Trump is winning despite losing

Fox News anchor Chris Wallace while on the air Friday shut down a claim that President Trump was “winning even as he is losing.”

During a conversation with Wallace, fellow reporter John Roberts said, “The president does seem in a way, though, Chris, to be winning even as he is losing in the current vote count because for his die-hard fans, he is trying to make the case that he didn’t really lose the election, that it was taken from him.”

He then prompted Wallace for his take on the situation, asking, “Is that an argument that he can credibly make?”

Fox’s John Roberts: “The president does seem though in a way, Chris to be winning even as he is losing in the current vote count” pic.twitter.com/i6KCg6BCLj

— Andrew Lawrence (@ndrew_lawrence) November 13, 2020

Wallace quickly dismissed the question, noting that the magnitude of the alleged fraud is too large to seem legitimate.

“Well, not in terms of the numbers at least so far,” Wallace replied. “Unless we see something from these lawsuits that we haven’t seen so far, which is serious fraud and fraud of a dimension that it would actually overturn the results.”

He stated that unlike in 2000, when the race in Florida came down to 500 votes, the races in the states in question in 2020 resulted in a difference of 40,000 to 50,000 votes.

“So unless we see fraud of that dimension, I don’t know that he can credibly say that the election has been taken from him,” Wallace said.

But despite those facts, Wallace said he assumes the president will continue to fight the outcome.

“As we know, Donald Trump got more votes than any person in history running for president this year except for Joe Biden,” he said.

In a statement to The Hill Saturday, Roberts appeared to clarify his remarks to Wallace. 

“During an interview with my colleague Chris Wallace yesterday, my point was that the Trump campaign’s challenges appear to be, in part, an attempt by the President to create a narrative that he is not ‘losing’ the election to Biden, rather, it is being taken from him,” he said. 

“He is winning that argument with his supporters and they are convinced that widespread voting irregularities led to the current vote count. In no way was I suggesting President Trump is winning the vote count and I asked Chris Wallace whether that was an argument President Trump could credibly make. Chris responded that based on the vote count, it wasn’t. He was offering his analysis to a question about what President Trump is trying to do,” he continued. 

Fox was one of the major outlets that called the presidential race for Biden.

Trump on Friday spoke for the first time since Biden was announced president-elect but made no mention of the election outcome or his various lawsuits alleging electoral fraud.

Updated 7:11 p.m.